


PARADIS ISLAND

by nymphetsbastard



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, College Student Eren Yeager, Eventual Smut, F/F, Fluff and Smut, Friends With Benefits, Hange Zoë & Levi Are Best Friends, LGBTQ Character, Lesbian Character, Light Angst, Reader-Insert, yelena - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-19
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-17 10:49:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 27,629
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28847823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nymphetsbastard/pseuds/nymphetsbastard
Summary: Growing up religious, you never expected your life to take the turn it did. Innocent looks in the hallway turned into touches that went lower and lower. You never expected to have sex this early.But then again, you never expected it to be with a woman either.
Relationships: Pieck Finger/Yelena, Yelena (Shingeki no Kyojin)/Reader
Comments: 64
Kudos: 353





	1. COLLEGE FLU

  
Leaving home was always a rough time for both parent and child. Anybody who grew up in a loving home tended to stick to that home like glue, not wanting to separate from it and instead choosing to go to schools and jobs closer to home, closer to family. Those without however, preferred their freedom. When the clock struck 12 and everybody went to sleep was the only time they'd have to themselves, the only time they'd ever have to feel safe and relaxed — leaving home wasn't as hard on them.

You...well you were a different story. You didn't like a lot of things, being grabbed, having things snatched out of your hands, people taking your food without permission, somebody talking to you when you're clearly trying to avoid them — the list could go on. But growing up leaving you home never seemed to cross your mind. For whatever reason you felt like things were fine at home, not perfect but not terrible either, nine year old you didn't stop to think that one day you'd have to make the decision to move away from your friends and family. The small town you were in had a lot of older people, ones that never separated from their high school popularity phase and believed that the world revolved around them and them only, the others were newly young adults seeking any way out. You hoped you'd be the ladder.

Your parents had never spoken to you about leaving the house, meaning you grew up only learning what was taught in school. World War One and two, Pearl Harbor, slavery, and other shitty thing America did and or went through throughout the course of centuries on end — all only ever learned or discussed in school. The main focus in your household was religion and religion only. It's what you grew up to be right, nothing else existed in your mind besides that.

There was nothing wrong with that. Well...until around the time high school hit. Senior year was the year stressed to you since you were a freshman, you could barley fathom the fact that you'd have to apply for colleges, work on a bunch of different essays and possibly move away when you were young and you could still barley understand it now. But it was only then, then when they had handed you that slip of paper of which colleges you were going to apply to did you realize something; you didn't want to end up in a boring old relationship with a guy from your sophomore geometry class, get married, have a couple of kids that would send you to a nursing home and never live the life you dreamed of having.

You wanted that Disney channel teenage life, teenage adventures that would give you enough memories to last a lifetime and successfully say you lived your life to the fullest. While your teenage years had been spent in a church every weekday, your nose in school books and your bedtime forever stuck at the time 8:30, you swore your adulthood would be different.

Everything would be different.

"Are you sure you're not missing anything, hun?" Your mother asked nervously watching you pack the trunk up with your suitcase and extra bags. You yawned into your hand due to the more than early hours you guys were beginning the trip in order to make it early to your destination.

"You made a list mom, I don't think there's anything I could miss." She smiled your small joke and got in the passenger seat of the car, "You know, you guys really don't have to come. It's nearly a 4 and half hour drive over there, not including the drive back." You mentioned

"We already told you we're going to stop by my mother in laws and stay for a while." Your father explained, you sighed and got into the backseat of the car.

You brought your favorite stuffy and laid your head on it against the window as you prepared yourself for the 4 hour drive from your old childhood home to a new place where new memories could be made. It felt almost nostalgic watching your entire childhood fly by from behind a window. The blue slide you loved going up and down on till you felt like throwing up. The metal pole that always terrified you trying to go down. The monkey bars you taught yourself to climb because of the lack of friends you had that could teachyou. It all seemed to disappear behind flashes of trees and road as the car drifted further and further away from the place you called home.

"Morning sunshine! We're here!" Your father exclaimed, waking you out of your slumber. You groaned quietly and rubbed the sleep out of your eyes, taking a moment to look out the window at the large building in front of you. Gawking at the size, you shook your head and stepped out of the car to get a closer look.

"This is much smaller than the one I went to." Mentioned your father, squinting up at the building and helping you pull your suitcase out of the trunk.

"That's because you went to community college, honey." You chuckled at your moms observation and rolled your suitcase up to the sidewalk.

"Well I'll see you guys—" you started until your words were cut off by your mother slapping her hands down on your shoulders and giving you a firm look.

"I better not come visit you in a few months and see you with a purple Mohawk, piercings and a girlfriend, you hear me?" You nodded at her dramatic remarks and felt yourself internally cringe at her words.

"Hopefully we come back to you with a kind little boyfriend and a college degree we can show off to the rest of the family." Your father said, wrapping his arm around his wife's shoulders and gave you a tight lipped smile.

"Call us when you get settled and show us your roommate."

"And if they're anything we told you to not look like or if they smoke, drink or are sexually active in public, please change roommates."

They listed off, you internally rolled your eyes but still managed to give them a nod.

"Okay, I get it. Bye." You waved them off and stayed on the sidewalk till their old beat up grey car pulled away from the university.

Sighing, you rolled your shoulders back, grabbed all your things and walked the 10 minutes all the way to your side of the dorms. Personally, you had no clue who your roommate was besides their name but you knew even if you got a wild one you wouldn't change rooms. It didn't matter to you wether or not your roommate had purple hair, while your parents and nearly everyone in life tended to stick their nose in the business of others, you had no care in the world about anybody else.

From the moment you stepped into your new room, your nostrils were immediately being wrapped in by the smell of vanilla and incense. You looked around the room and noticed that only half of it was done up while the other was plain and void of any decoration.

"Hello, who are you?" A soft voice asked politely and there in front of you stood one of the prettiest girls you'd ever seen. She was a short young woman with long, disheveled shoulder-length black hair, a Greek nose and relaxed dark eyes.

"Oh sorry! I'm your new roommate, you're Pieck Finger, right?" You greeted her, shaking her surprisingly soft hands and placing your bags down on the floor next to you.

"Sorry about the smell, I'm lighting some incense to cleanse the new room. I just got here last night."

"Mhm, are you religious?" You asked, pointing to the black leather notebook in her hand. She looked down at it but smiled and shook her head.

"Ah no, I'm Agnostic. Although my childhood friend practices Hinduism and I guess I pick up on some things." She explained, you nodded at her words and made a mental note to ask her what the hell agnostic meant at a later time. Her eyes went down to the bags in your hand and reached out to grab your suitcase.

"Here I got this, I'll put this on your side of the bed and let me know if I can help with setting anything up." She offered kindly, you nodded at her offer and the two of you immediately got to work.

As you folded your clothes into a drawer and hung them up in a closet and Pieck finished wrapping your bed in it's covers and blankets, the two of you talked. Talked as if you'd been friends since birth. Pieck felt like someone you could truly se yourself being friends with in the long run of college, she was also someone your parents would most likely accept and allow you to stay with. The two of you bonded over certain interests, Pieck had a knack for writing — poems, full books, it didn't matter; you were the artistic one. Always doodling on something or recreating famous art paintings in your room, usually religious paintings as your parents always told you that if you were going to have painting as a hobby you might as well paint something useful.

"Finally, we're done." You sighed, exhaustedly throwing yourself onto the newly made bed. Pieck chuckled and stood up, grabbing her belongings and putting them into a small book bag.

"Hey, me and my friends are meeting in the library later, would you like to come?" She asked, you mulled over the idea for a quick second and nodded your head.

The walk from your dorm and the library gave you and Pieck even more time to get to know each other. She explained how most people from her old high school had come to the nearest college, it being this one which is why she never worried about not making any friends. Your eyes nearly popped out of your eye socket as you stepped up to the large library building, it being much bigger than any library your town had to offer. Pieck held the door open for you as you stepped in and took a moment to admire the large area.

"Psst, Pieck!" Whispered a voice, you looked over to see a brown haired woman in big round glasses waving the two of you over with a wide grin on her face. Pieck waved back and walked over the round table with the two other people sitting and you following behind her.

"Hey guys, this is my new roommate. This is—"

"Hange Zoë, nice to meet you!" The glasses wearing woman exclaimed excitedly taking your hand in her and shaking it vigorously. A nearby librarian glared her way and hushed her, she smiled and apologized to the old woman.

"I'm Porco." Replied the blonde boy on the other side of the table dryly. 

You waved at him awkwardly and sat down next to Pieck, yet it was only after they began pulling out their books did you realize you had nothing with you. Tapping the dark haired girl on the shoulder, you motioned towards the bookshelf's and stood up to leave once Pieck nodded her head.

You walked around aimlessly with no true destination or book in mind till you came across a bookshelf, this one different than the others and tucked away in a little corner. It was old and basic but it still had integrity. The wood was straight and it hugged the wall. On closer inspection you could see scratches, the wood a little more pale where it had been dinged. You touched the roughness, not minding one bit and looked at the books inside. The fiction section had always been your favorite growing up, your parents believed books like Harry Potter were some sort of books that demonic and plaguing words hidden within them so you only ever grew up reading them in short amounts of time in the library before they could find you.

A small gasp made its way up your throat as your eyes landed across a book titled Alice in Wonderland, one of your top favorites. The ladder that usually came along with each bookshelf was currently being occupied yet this specific bookshelf seemed to take up nearly the entire wall of the library — this might've been one of the first things you couldn't successfully grab with ease. You reached your hand up to grab the book, your fingertips only slightly touching them before the book suddenly disappeared from your grasp and a warm presence creeped up behind you, towering over your frame.

Looking up, your eyes met a pair deep dark eyes staring down at you, the book now forgotten in your mind as it was now clouded with the face of the person in front of you. It was only after a couple seconds that you blinked out of your trance and stepped back, falling straight between the bookshelf and the person. You felt...intimidated. The person in front of you was more than taller than you, a height you thought was nearly impossible. They tilted their head to the side, bent down a bit and held the book out in their hand as your eyes stayed trained on theirs.

"Do you want it?" They asked, you nearly jumped in your skin at the sound of their somewhat deep voice.

"Huh?"

"The book." You looked down and finally registered the fact that they'd picked up the book you were grabbing at and now held it out to you.

"O-oh right, thank you." You stuttered, mentally cursing yourself for acting this way. While your eyes strayed away from theirs, they went downward to the person's appearance.

They wore a dark green turtleneck sweater paired with high waisted black pants, accentuating their long legs and black lace up Oxford shoes — their entire appearance intimidated you. The center of their nose pierced through with silver piece of jewelry.

"I..." you regretted opening your mouth the second the words came out, "gotta go," the words spilled out of your mouth as you immediately walked around them and towards your table, the interaction still replaying in your head on loop. It wasn't until you rapidly sat yourself down next to Pieck that you felt like you could breath.

You weren't the most social person in the world but you also weren't the most nervous, but they...their presence, their height, the look in their eyes, it all seemed to send you into frenzy. Ignoring the slightly worried look you got from Pieck, you open the notebook given to you and tried to let the interaction seep away into your memories. Yet it didn't work. Every word on the paper seemed to fly over your head, your mind never sticking to the sentences given to you. Hell, you could barley read about Alice's shitty life without comparing it to what had just occurred. It was all too fresh. Too new. Too...interesting.

"Mornin' Pieck." Greeted a deep voice from behind you, turning around you were faced with a tall blonde haired man with small circle glasses resting on his nose.

"Good mornin, Zeke." Pieck responded kindly, the man looked around the table greeting everyone till his eyes met yours.

"I don't think I've met you before, and who must you be?" He bowed down respectfully and held out his hand, you looked at it confused for a second before sliding your hand into his and watching as he leaned his head down to plant a kiss at the back of your hand.

Before you could protest, a different hand gripped Zeke's shoulder, he pulled away and turned around to find his female companion standing above him with a blank expression on her face — one he'd gotten used to over the course of their friendship. Meanwhile your breath was caught in your throat at the sight of the intimidating person you'd met only moments before.

"Your book, Zeke." They said plainly, Zeke pulled away from you and took the textbook of their hands, thanking them and skimming through the textbook as both of your eyes never left theirs.

"Good morning, Yelena." Pieck greeted her with a smile, finally, Yelena's eyes drifted away from yours and were now on Pieck, the sides of her lips quirking up into a smirk for a second.

"Good morning, Pieck." Your eyes went back and forth between them in confusion until another person popped up behind Zeke.

"Hey guys, hey hange, Pieck." The dark haired man bun wearing boy said, leaning his arm against Zeke's shoulder despite them being the same height. 

"Guess I'm just invisible then" spoke up Porco with an offended look on his face, the dark haired boy simply looked at him and blinked.

"Oh no I knew you were there, I just don't care. Anyways, are you guys coming to my big party tonight?" He asked excitedly, Zeke scoffed and pushed his glasses further up his face.

"Tch, we're not children, Eren. Why would we go to some teenage party?" Eren scoffed at the blonde mans response.

"Yeah obviously not you, old man, you're fucking ancient. I was talking to Pieck and..." he looked at you with a confused expression before shrugging and pointing at you, "and her."

"I'm not even that old—"

"Sorry, Eren but you already know my answer." She apologized, Eren pouted and groaned.

"Oh come on, please, Pieck? The last time you went everybody loved you, please?" He begged Pieck, placing his hands on her arm that was leaned against the wooden chair she sat at.

"Aw sorry, kid. I love them all too but I gotta tutoring session today." She apologized sympathetically, patting the boys head and turning to you, "what about you?" 

You jumped at the sudden spotlight on you but shook your head regardless, "If Pieck's not going then neither am I." Eren groaned again and tried puppy dog eyes on the long haired woman in front of him.

"Look Pieck, you're deriving your new friend here with the experience of a fun college party." She smiled at his explanation which apparently told Eren enough that he stopped bugging her and stood up to his full height, slamming his shoulder into Zeke's as he walked away and mumbled something under his breath. Zeke almost turned around to go after him until Yelena outstretched her arm to stop him.

"He's a child." She pointed out

"He's a little shit, is what he is." Zeke complained, you looked over at Hange for information. 

"They're brothers." She stated, your mouth made an o shape as you finally came to understand why the two seemed to have so much beef between them.

"Half brothers, Hange. Don't associate me with that brat." Zeke huffed, everyone chuckling at the mans clear discomfort with him and Eren being in the same room let alone sentence. "Anyways, we've gotta go, me and Yelena have business to take care of." Zeke said.

"Jeez, you make it sound like the two of you are hooking up." Porco mentioned with a disgusted look on his face,

"What if we are?" He joked playfully until he looked up to see Yelena towering over him with a straight look on her face, Zeke cleared his throat and shook his head, "Kidding, kidding."

The two of them walked out of the library and the three other people at your table continued on their reading while your mind was racked with a bunch of questions of the new characters you just met. You tried to avoid eye contact with Yelena when she was leaving but could still feel her piercing gaze stay onto you until she couldn't anymore.

"So are they?" You inquired with a whisper, leaning over Pieck's shoulder

"Are they what?"

"Zeke and Yelena. Are they..." you raised your eyebrows as the words clicked in Pieck's mind and the other two at the table began laughing into their books.

"No, sweetie, they're not sleeping together or dating." She denied

"Pfft, the day we see Yelena with a man is the day pigs fly." Chuckled Porco, you looked at them confused at their jokes.

"Yelena's a lesbian, babe." Pieck finished your thought and your eyes slightly widened at her response, not expecting it. Embarrassment silently creeped into your mind as you groaned and tucked your head into your arms.

"Well now I feel stupid." The three of them laughed and Pieck rubbed your back. 

For some reason, those words felt like a small weight lifted off your shoulders. You couldn't understand why you felt so...happy that she wasn't with Zeke in that way. Maybe you just wanted to her friend. Yeah....that had to be it....her friend.


	2. Alleyway Lover

PIECK'S FRIENDS couldn't be described anything short of...odd. Porco didn't talk much and when he did it was always sarcasm slipping out of his tongue and multiple eye rolls. Hange was....a character. You had recently come to find out about their wild science obsession that they swore up and down wasn't an obsession, was the main part of their personality. They rambled about random scientific theories that were proven right, wrong, unidentifiable and theories they believed to be correct. It was interesting and gave you a new perceptive on a lot of things you haven't thought about before.

Hange tackled you into a hug and rocked the two of you back and forth on the sidewalk outside of the library. Porco both tried and failed trying to get them off you and with a sigh he just gave up.

"I'm gonna miss you so much! Thank you for listening to me!" They pulled away with a gasp, "We need to hang out again soon! I have so much to tell you about!" You laughed at their excitement

"Okay okay Hange, I think she gets it." Pieck chuckled lightly, Hange dismissively waved their hand at their dark haired friend and pushed up their satchel.

"Bye! It was nice meeting you!" Hange exclaimed, waving their arm around wildly and almost smacking Porco in the face, earning them a glare from the blonde.

"See ya." Porco waved, ignoring Hange's air talking towards you that said 'call me' with a fake phone in their hand.

Laughing at Hange being yanked away by Porco for taking too long, you turned back to Pieck as she linked her arm in yours.

"You're friends are interesting." You pointed out, Pieck giggled and nodded

"Yeah they're definitely different, but I prefer a couple of weirdos than a big group of fake friends." Nodding in understanding, you began to think back to your home town.

"I wouldn't know. I've never had many friends and the one friend I did have barley paid attention to me or my life so..." you mumbled, drifting off thinking about how sad your life actually was.

"Well don't worry, you're not missing out on much." Pieck nudged you, "I had a big group of friends in high school and the one thing I learned is that popular people are only popular for their looks, definitely not personality." You two laughed together, "The group ended up being problematic for a lot of reasons and the only ones left that were still close were me and Porco. Funny thing is, Hange used to be considered a huge nerd in our school and our group made fun of them but me and Porco hung out with them and for some reason we just..,couldn't shake em off. They love us and we love them, even they do have a little screws loose in the head."

You laughed her joke but couldn't help but think about yourself. Wishing you had friends that cared about you and talked about you like Pieck did even when you weren't around.

Noticing your frown, Pieck nudged you once more, "And now you're our friend" you smiled at her and nodded. The one question that had been itching at your for hours finally felt like enough as you looked down at your moving feet.

"So...what's the deal with...Yelena?" It felt almost sinful saying her name, Pieck's attention instantly turned to you at the mention of her name.

"What do you mean?"

"Like...are you guys friends or....? How did you become close?" You asked hesitantly, the fair skinned girl looked over at you with a raised eyebrow.

"Are you asking me how to get a date with Yelena?" Pieck questioned, you stopped in your tracks and looked at her with wide eyes.

"No no no no no, I-I'm not— I don't— my religion I-" you sputtered out nervously, Pieck's eyebrows came together at your random word vomit as she crossed her arms staring at you, "I mean! I'm fine with gay people I just— I'm not" your words were cut off by Pieck's soft angelic laugh.

"Relax, kid. I don't think you're homophobic but your questions were a little...off putting" She searched for the words to say and cringed at the one she came up with, you shook you head and sighed.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to intrude."

"No it's fine. I'm not actually close with Yelena...in that way, I am in other ways but we're not really good with day to day conversations. That's Zeke's job. They've been friends since middle school I think and I guess it's stayed that way, don't know why but I guess history keeps friendship alive." She shrugged, you nodded and fished out your dorm room key out of your pocket, unlocking the door and bringing the two of you inside.

Honestly, you didn't understand why you felt such a pull towards Yelena. She was nothing short of intimidating, she wasn't short of anything actually. Her tall stature loomed over everybody in the room no matter how tall they believed they were, she was taller. Not only that, her dark colored sanpaku eyes made her already bored expressions look so blank yet so intimidating at the same time. She was an enigma to you. One you couldn't figure out.

"Shit, we don't have anything to drink." Pieck cursed, taking a look inside the mini fridge she had under her desk. Technically there wasn't enough space in the door to get an actual fridge so Pieck had just bought a mini fridge and insisted the two of you share it.

"I'll get some juice from the vending machine." You offered, Pieck let out a breath and gratefully took your offer.

"Here, buy me a cranberry juice, please?" You took the money Pieck handed you and nodded, sliding on some frog slippers and making your way own out of the dorm and towards the vending machine.

Truthfully? You had no idea where the vending machine was. A small glance towards it while walking past gave you idea enough that the machine existed, where? Well you'd have to figure that out. Trying to retrace your steps at any was hard enough given how short your memory was so you tried your best to think of the last time you crossed it. You probably looked crazy peaking over every corner you came across and looking up at the sky trying to remember but it was nearly one in the morning so you doubted anyone was just casually walking around for fun.

"Are you looking for something?" Asked a familiar voice from behind you, you whipped around and definitely did not make eye contact with whoever was in front of you. Your eyes slowly slid up till they landed on the two eyes you couldn't get out of your mind.

"Huh?" You choked out

"You're walking around like you don't know where you're going, are you looking for something?" She explained patiently, you blinked as the wheels in your head finally began turning.

"O-oh yeah, I am actually! Do you know where the vending machine is?" You asked despite your nervousness, the short haired girl looked at you with a blank face for a moment before she titled her head to the side and let her eyes fall behind you to the large vending machine that sat at the end of the open alleyway. Nearly heating up in embarrassment, you quietly thanked her and walked over to the large machine.

Your mind was so clouded with forcing yourself to not embarrass yourself while also trying to remember what drink Pieck asked you to get her that you didn't even notice the steps getting closer. Her steps got closer and closer till she walked around your crouched frame and leaned against the wall. You could barley look over at her, only catching the click of metal and the hiss of a lighter. Yelena snapped the metal lighter shut and looked over at you.

"You like cranberry juice?" She asked, pointing at the small bottle in your hand as a small smirk gracing her lips as she popped the cigarette in her mouth.

"Mmh? Oh no this isn't for me it's...it's for Pieck." You explained, Yelena simply nodded and continued taking a drag from the deadly paper wrapped nicotine. Deciding to finally make a move, you walked over to her and leaned against the wall as she'd done previously.

"Smoking is bad for you." You said bluntly, Yelena chuckled and blew the smoke out of her nose.

"I know." She stated simply.

It was a one word response, not much for a conversation but it didn't need to be. You were fine just staring at her while she stared right back, not a word being said. For once in your life, silence wasn't awkward or condescending. It was just...quiet. The kind of quiet you seeked in the middle of the night when your parents fought or when the day felt like too much, the kind of quiet you craved in the middle of an overcrowded area, the kind of quiet you longed for. You didn't mind the quiet. 

You didn't mind the quiet with her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wattpad: SUGACODED  
> Instagram: nymphetsbastard   
> Make sure to give a kudos, comment and share to others, thank you!❤️


	3. Isn’t She Lovely?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> EXTRA CHAPTER DONT SKIP

**SONG: GONE, GONE/THANK YOU**

In your eyes is your humanity, the person you really are. There are times it gets lost, when you wear that facade, the facade of not caring about anyone or anything. But in that alleyway you stared into each other's souls. She said cheeky was good; she let you be yourself. You laughed so much, at times stopping because you knew a torrent of giggles would wake any scholars in nearby dorms. That's all you ever needed to connect to her in that moment, you and her, just eyes, no words. If you were mute your words and hushed giggled it would be all the same.

You bit your lip, trying to hold back to the unattractive snort that nearly made it out as Yelena chuckled at you,

"Hey, I'm serious! It was a very traumatizing experience." She joked, pushing your shoulder lightly

"And you just had to share that traumatic experience with me of all people?"

"Well, who else was I gonna tell the story of how I found a birthmark in the shape of Texas on Zeke's ass?" At that point you couldn't let it in and just begin laughing at her serious face, you looked away and leaned your head on your hand that rested on your knees as the two of you sat on the sidewalk.

"Literally anyone else! You have so many friends." You exclaimed. Yelena sighed and leaned back, holding herself up on one arm and running the other hand through her short blond hair.

"Not real friends. My 'friends' haven't laughed with me like this in...years." She revealed

"What about Zeke?" Just as the words slipped out, the blond woman's eyes widened as she side eyed you.

"Zeke? You think Zeke has any humors bone in his body?" Yelena asked incredulously, at that you truly snorted and let your head fall forward.

"Okay, okay, fair point." You agreed, lifting your head up just on time to see the woman letting her tongue slip out from her mouth and wet her pink lips, a silver shine of metal catching your eye in a quick second.

"You have a tongue piercing?" You asked curiously, besides the obvious silver septum piercing with horns pointing out the end, you never even noticed the metal piece in her mouth.

"Yeah" was all she said, dropping her hand between her man spread legs and looking at you with a head tilt.

"Can I see?" Yelena looked at you and smirked before leaning in closer

"Well you'd have to take your pants off for that." You blinked

"h-huh?" You stuttered, not expecting the answer. The blond chuckled at your nervous state and stood up in front of you, leaning down and grabbing your chin in her hand, her face getting closer to yours.

"You're an adorable little kitten, aren't you?" She whispered, you sat paralyzed as the two of you stared into each other's eyes once more, your eyes faltering down to her lips once more.

Sucking your teeth, you looked away from her sharp gaze and focused your attention on a random garbage bag a couple feet away from you .

"I have a name, you know?" You asked with a raised eyebrow, Yelena stood up at her full height and tucked her hands into her pockets looking down at you.

"Of course you do. See you around, kitten." Were her final words before she sauntered off, leaving you starstruck on the sidewalk.

You dropped your head backwards till it hit the soft plush bed you'd been craving the entire day. Falling asleep was one of the best parts of the day, there in the cozy blankets, snug and safe was where you could finally let go and let the world of dreams come to you in its dancing way. Let your mind rewind recent events and turn it into some weird ball of a mess that you would t even remember once the sun rose and your tired eyes blinked open.

Warm hands shrugged you somewhat roughly, effectively waking you up and not giving your mind enough time to catch up.

"Psst, it's time to wake up." Whispered a soft voice, you groaned and rubbed your eyes.

Once you adjusted to the natural lights beaming through the window, your mind finally processed Pieck running around your shared bedroom and dropping random clothes onto your bed hurriedly.

"What's going on?" You asked groggily

"You told me you have Professor Erwin first period, I had him last year and trust me you do not want to be late to his class, especially on the first day." She rushed out, handing you a random pair of sneakers as the wheels in your head finally began turning and you realized you had to get your ass out the door and to his classroom in 15 minutes.

"Oh fuck-" you cursed, throwing on the clothes Pieck had picked out for you and being stopped in your tracks by the short woman who shoved a croissant in your mouth and pushed you out of the dorm, not waiting to hear your mumble of gratitude from behind the piece of bread and butter.

Honestly, it hadn't processed how much Pieck for you beforehand until you made it to class and realized she'd packed your school laptop, a notebook and pencil in your bag as you made it to a random seat in Erwin's class just before he closed the door. You sent a prayer to the goddess known as Pieck Finger and immediately began immersing yourself into whatever came out of your professors mouth.

A small noise from behind you caused you to turn around and notice Hange sitting directly behind you with a wide smile. They waved excitedly at you but put their pen up to their lips as a way to tell you to be quiet. You smiled at them and turned back to focus to the lesson, making sure to write down anything that seemed slightly important. It was only after class that you felt you could finally breathe.

"Hey again!" Exclaimed a voice beside you, you looked over and smiled over at Hange.

"Hey Hange, what's up?"

"Nothing much, I woke up super early today and even got in a early jog before class."

"Pfft, cant relate. I woke up so later today by the time I even gained consciousness Pieck had already packed my bags, thrown a random outfit at me, put a croissant in my mouth and threw me out the door" you explained, Hange laughed and nodded.

"Yep, sounds like Pieck. She's just naturally like that, although I'm surprised she didn't wake you up earlier rather than just shoving you out the door." Hange observed, you shrugged.

"Oh well, at least I made it on time. I'm pretty sure Erwin was about two seconds from shoving the door in my face." The two of you laughed at the joke till you finally made it to a cross way.

"I gotta go but I'll see you later, okay?" Hange patted your shoulder and you nodded at their words, agreeing to meet up with them sometime after your classes.

Picking a random seat, you slumped down in your chair and began pulling out your laptop as the teacher started to set their things up as well. The warm hand in your cheek nearly lulled you into a slumber as the class dragged on for a while. After the 4th period, you could finally rest your head on your arms and lean against the desk as your teacher just rambled on about their life story, effectively dragging out the period even longer.

Finally, you lifted your head and rubbed the back of your neck as you made your way back to your dorm room. A mistake on your part to lay your head on a hard desk and ruin your posture even more, straining your neck in order to find a comfortable position. This tiredness didn't seem to pick up on the 'Do Not Disturb' sign at the handle of your door as you pushed your way into the room. Mistake.

The two bodies occupying the bed on the right jumped apart at the sound of the door opening but didn't turn around to face you.

"Can't you read?!" Shouted a familiar voice, your eyes adjusted to the darkness in the room and noticed Pieck laying under a mess of short blonde hair, her eyes not meeting yours until you spoke up.

"Oh shit...I- sorry" you stuttered out in a moment of shock, and only then did Pieck's brown eyes met yours. They widened significantly and pushed the blonde body off of them, revealing the same face you had been staring and blushing at the night before.

"Wait—!"

Now that was when you well and truly slammed the door shut and stepped back, not waiting to hear Pieck's response before immediately doing a 180 and started walking down the hallway. The squeak of a door behind you and the rush of steps trying to catch up to you was all you needed to hear to know that Pieck had run out after you.

She grabbed your arm and spinner you around, "Oh my god, I am so sorry! I forgot to tell you about the sign and—" she sputtered out

"Pieck it's fine! I'm not your mom, I can't stop you from having sex." your eyes lifted away from Pieck's, taking notice of Yelena who stood outside your dorm room door watching the interaction with the same blank expression she always wore. "But a warning would be very much appreciated next time." She sighed and pulled you into her arms.

"Of course, of course. I'm so sorry, it completely slipped my mind today." Pieck apologized profusely, while you wanted to be even a bit mad, you couldn't help but wrap your arms around her as well yet let your eyes fall back onto Yelena.

It was only now that you felt awful about last night, the moment you and Yelena shared made you feel like you had gone behind Pieck's back and made out with her girlfriend or something. You pulled away from the hug and adjusted the straps of your bag on your shoulders.

"Um you guys can...continue, I'm just gonna go." You said, motioning away awkwardly trying to hint at your new escape. 

"No no no you don't have to, we could just find somewhere else to go, I don't wanna kick you out of your own room." Pieck insisted, regret flashing in her eyes at your words.

Subconsciously, your eyes went back to Yelena again. "No it's fine, I'm meeting up with Hange in the library anyway. You two...do what you do. I'll bring you back something to eat." You dismissed Pieck's suggestion, waving her off and turning around to make your way to the library, not turning your back once to see not only one but two eyes burning into the back of your skull.

Mistakes were all you seemed to be making today.

Yet you paid to the constant buzzing coming from your back pocket as you made your way to your local library. Feelingsweren't something you were really used to. Whenever you fell on the playground as a child or injured yourself in any way your parents had always told you to suck it up and stop crying. So you did. If you fell, if you got hurt, wether emotionally or physically it didn't matter— you didn't cry, wail out in pain or even tell anyone; bandaging up your open wounds and feelings before they could spill out fo the world to see became a constant routine. Ironically enough, in young adulthood you now knew nothing of how to express emotions or even pinpoint how you were feeling.

Was it jealously? Sadness? You didn't know. You didn't know.You didn't know.You didn't know. You didn't know. And it drove you crazy. 

"Hey...are you okay?" You were pulled out of your trance as a warm hand landed on your shoulder, you raised your eyes up to the person and saw Hange standing in front of you with a look of worry written on their face.

"I-...i.." your mouth seemed to be in the place as your mind, scrambled and tangled together like cable wires.

"Hey, it's okay. Here, sit down, have some water." Hange said worriedly, handing you a water bottle from their bookbag. You took it gratefully and chugged down most of the water till you felt like your breath had finally caught up to you. Hange didn't ask any questions as they watched you chug down their water and opted to rubbing your back until you wiped your mouth and handed back the water to them.

"Thank you, Hange. I really needed that." You thanked

"Anytime." They smiled at you and began pulling out notebooks and pens from their bag, not looking at you. Biting your lips in nervousness, you tapped them on the shoulder.

"Aren't you gonna ask what's wrong?" You asked, genuine confusion on your face. It was nerve wracking to you, not having someone constantly breathing down your throat asking a bunch of questions and pressuring you into answer. The silent treatment to you was always a punishment growing up. And it only made it worse in adulthood.

"No. Unless you directly tell me you want to talk about something i don't feel like i should intrude." They explained, you blinked in surprise. "Would you like to talk abut anything?" They asked patiently. You shook your head, still mentally in shock at what a patient and understanding Hange is.

"Alright. How was college been for you so far? I was a complete mess when i first came but you seem to handling it well."

"Tch, you'd be surprised. Some teachers gave a first day assignment, others didn't, but it's nothing i can't handle. Oh and then..." You rambled some more as Hange listened intently and even told their own college stories.

And finally, after a long time of searching, you felt like you finally had a real friend. A real chance at creating something and becoming what your teenage self would've wanted you to be. It felt nice being heard, a rare privilege you never got back home yet something you desperately longed for and cringed onto the majority of your life. Having friends was a strange thing for someone as closed off as you but in that moment, you'd sell an arm and a leg for stay forever. To stay here listening to Hange as thy spoke of their young shenanigans and telling some old childhood stories knowing they were listening no interacting with you the entire time. To sty in a moment forever, why couldn't you? Truly a curse.

Only after almost 2 hours of talking did Hange finally drop the bomb of having to leave, soiling your perfect moment. 

"Alright hun, i gotta go help Eren with some science thing but i will definitely text you later." They let go of their titan grip on you and walked away, waving you a goodbye and leaving at the back of the library, alone. 

With. Sigh, you reached into your school bag and smiled softy at the book you pulled out. Thankfully in Pieck's rush to throw your school essentials in your bag, she snuck in the book you were eyeing the day before, 'Alice in Wonderland'. Another moment you were hoping to stay in forever. The crisp smell of a new book and the warm cozy feeling you got as you snuggled into the plush chair felt like heaven. Hange did not lie when they said they found the best spot in the library.

A smile creeped up on your lips as your eyes scanned the words on the pages, a warm feeling rising your chest and a sense of familiarity at Alice's situation. Just a regular girl stuck in a mundane boring life that'd been scheduled ahead of time for her with nobody to understand her curiosity and need to learn something knew. In a way, you understood her. Alice had achieved the life you wanted. To run away, to meet new people, go on adventure and find who the real Alice was. A journey in life you had yet to come across. Finding the real you, you wondered what it'd be.

"Hey." Flinching at the familiar voice, you craned your neck up to face the woman you had just caught making out with your roommate. "What's got you smiling like that over here?" Yelena asked, you dropped the smile on your face and put a placement piece on your book page before closing it and giving Yelena your full attention.

"Nothing." She quirked up an eyebrow at your one word response

"Damn, you sleep with one roommate and suddenly we're not friends." She teased, crossing her arms over her chest and smirking down at you. You rolled your eyes and looked back down at the cover of your book with the full intention to pack everything up and get out before you said something embarrassing.

"We were never friends" you mumbled, not thinking anything of it and not bothering to look up to see her expression. Well, it didn't seem like you ad to, especially when Yelena rested the palm of her hand on the side of the mini couch and bent down to your sitting height, looking directly into your eyes.

"Are you sure about that?" She questioned.

You breath caught in your throat at your closeness, so close you could smell the artificial lemon and lavender encompassing her clothing and the fresh mint in her breath. So close you see the splashes of brown in her dark eyes and non existent pores on her pale skin. For as short as you've known her, it never occurred to you how much of an effect she seemed to have over you until now.

"I don't think your girlfriend would appreciate this." You pointed out blankly, a hint of jealousy seeing out through your words.

Yet she smirked. She fucking smirked.

"Aw, is my little kitten jealous?" Yelena teased cockily, raising one of your hands up to wipe away any imaginary loose hairs on your forehead. Your eyebrows pinched together in annoyance as you pushed her hand out of your face. "What's wrong? Do you wanna be mine?"

You scoffed and leaned back in your seat to create space between the two of you, "Like i said, your girlfriend wouldn't appreciate this, or did you forget you had one of those?" You mocked.

"Yeah" Yelena said bluntly with a slight smile, you scoffed and looked at her in anger. Getting up from your seat, you grabbed your bag and stood in front of her.

"Seriously? You're such an asshole." You snapped at her as she just leaned against the table behind her without a care in the world. "You know, you don't deserve Pieck." You huffed before turning your back on her and walking away.

"You're right." You stopped walking at her words but kept your back to her, "I don't deserve Pieck." Her steps got closer till she was finally behind you and towering over you as she did to everyone, "Which is why she isn't mine." She whispered in your ear.

Yelena smirked at the confusion coating your face as she walked around you till she stood right in front of you. "We're not dating. Which you would've known if you didn't jump to conclusions." She joked, you crossed your arms defensively.

"I walk in on you on top of my roommate and, what? Am i supposed to assume you were just kissing as friends?"

"Yes, exactly." She agreed, you snorted and rolled your eyes again. "Oh come on, its college, who doesn't kiss their friends?"

You turned to her with an incredulous look on your face, "Me? Who the hell kisses their friends?" You exclaimed

"Ah i understand now, if you want a kiss you could've just asked, babe." Yelena flirted, giving you a wink and smile. You felt your eyes nearly roll to the back of your head as you shook your head and began walking towards the exit of the library.

"I already told you, we're not friends, Yelena" you stated, the blonde haired woman snickered and walked in front of you, stopping you once more.

"We can be strangers who kiss, kitten. Maybe then the jealously won't get to that pretty head of yours." She joked, your mouth dropped open and you pushed her out of our way for the final time, not bothering to turn around.

"We are not friends."

"Not yet, my love." Yelena called out behind you as you stormed off, laughing your angry face that did nothing but make her want you even more.

Pushing open your dorm room door, you were somewhat relieved you didn't find any more PG-13 action going on again but still groaned and kicked off your shoes at the front of the door. Pieck looked up from her mini alter and waved at you with a small crystal in her hand.

"Hey, again." She greeted you, you mumbled back a greeting and hopped straight into bed, "Ew, outside clothes on the bed, kid." Pieck complained, you whined at how right she was and sat up again.

"I know I'm just tired."You whined, Pieck chuckled lightly and put down her incense and stood up to throw you a towel.

"Well you've got maybe 30 minutes before your next class, try to take a nap." She suggested, "What's got you so tired anyway?"

"Mmh, after my fourth period class i spent almost 2 hours in the library talking with Hange and after they left i started reading the book you packed, thanks for that by the way. Anyways, your girlfri—close friend, friend who you kiss - whatever the hell you two are started bugging me while i was trying to read." You spilled tiredly

"You mean Yelena?" You nodded, "Mhm I didn't know you guys were friends." Pieck inquired, you groaned again and stood up to stretch.

"We are NOTfriends." You insisted, ready to head out the door, "you can have her all to yourself." you convinced yourself.


	4. lovely, lovely, lovely

**TAKE ME TO CHURCH -** hozier

  
  
THE STEAM ENCOMPASSES you as you stand in the shower, holding yourself and letting the piercing hot water splash against your skin. Your breathing getting heavier and heavier the more thoughts that ran through your head. A shower was a place that truly left you alone with your thoughts. Wether you sang your heart out, created an argument in your head or watched a showroom the inside — the shower was a place that allowed you to let yourself be.

At this point in time, you didn't know who you were. Everything you thought you knew about yourself felt...wrong. You used to think you could never make fiends, that your self sabotaging and awkward personality would drive everyone away to the point of no return, you never imaged yourself to be happy in college. Just like everyday in your old life, you thought you'd be alone again. But here you were. It'd only been 4 days since you got here and yet you already felt happier here than you ever did back "home". It was strange. 

Strange how your entire closeted, close off life you'd never thought someone could be on your mind this much. You tried and you tried to push her out of your mind but that bored yet teasing expression of hers couldn't be painted over with a simple thought. Her soft blonde hair that brushed against your cheek anytime she bent down to our height, her cold long finger that always seemed to find a way on you every time she came around, that mocking tone she had under voice it all sent you into a frenzy. She was definitely the girl your parents had warned you about. While lacking in a bright blue Mohawk on her head, Yelena definitely participated in acts of...sin in more ways than one. With Pieck nonetheless. 

Damn, if only you were Pieck

You shook your head sharply at the intrusive thought and immediately shut off the now freezing cold water. But you didn't move. Your hand hovered over the faucet after shutting it off, almost replaying those words in your head. Insecurities weren't a new concept to you, quite a regular occurrence honestly— yet you couldn't pinpoint why you wanted to be Pieck. Was it her beauty? Her kind voice? Her kind everything? Was it Yelena?

A sharp sting drew a hiss out of your mouth upon realizing how hard you were biting down on your lip, touching the sensitive area carefully before fully stepping out of the shower and wrapping a fluffy white towel around your naked frame. The cold air did nothing to help as you entered your room and began changing. Pieck had already went off to pick up dinner leaving you to have the room all to yourself.

It'd been only a day since your last interaction with Yelena but that didn't stop her from constantly running around in your mind throughout the day. It was a pain. A pain not knowing how to know how t feel or figure out how you feel. A pain knowing how easy it is for everyone else, so why was it so hard for you?

The obnoxious ringtone coming from your laptop made you get up from your bed and sit down at your desk, opening the laptop and finding a picture of your mother and father pop up on he screen. With a bit of hesitation, you clicked the green button and were quickly greeted with your parents siting on the couch, their eyes squinted at the screen likely trying to figure out the skype feature.

"Oh, is it on?" Asked your mother, her husband nodded an pulled her away from the screen it's a wave your way

"Hello, can you hear us?!" You cringed at their yelling and connected your headphones to your laptop to avoid blowing out the eardrums of any eavesdroppers walking by.

"Yes yes, i can hear you just fine."

"Ah okay, hey honey! How's college? Make any new friends?" Your mother asked curiously

"Yes actually my roommate she—"

"Is she nice? What's her name? Is she nice? Is she religious? Does sh have any piercings or tattoos?" They questioned, cutting you off from speaking.

You sighed, "Her name's Pieck, she's very nice and no she does not have any piercings or tattoos."

"You didn't answer my question"

"Uh I'm not sure she...hasn't told me" you lied, your parents gave each other a look before turning back

"Alright well if it's anything satanic you better find a new roommate— better yet, an entirely new room in general. We don't need you coming home with a demon attached to you now" your father explained, trying to make a joke.

"Yeah..." You laughed lightly out of curtesy.

"Anything else? Any other friends or maybe even a boyfriend?" Your mom hinted, you bit your lip and began gathering our thoughts carefully.

Any small slip would get your bags packed and an exorcism given to you effective immediately.

"Well um not a boyfriend but..."

"Oh my- who is he? What's his name? Is he religious? He better not have any—" your mom gasped

"No no no no, he doesn't have any piercings or tattoos" you sighed, "um i don't know, i barley know he-him but...he makes me feel...weird every time he's around. He pokes fun at me just to make me mad on purpose and let's me just talk, and....he listens." Your words drifted off as you thought about it more

"Is he religious?" Those moments of course, could never last with your parents. Why would you be shocked anyways? That's all they ever cared about.

"Uh yeah, sure." Personally, you had no clue if Yelena was religious but the position you found her and Pieck in wasn't very PG-13, parental friendly.

"Ooh this is so exciting! What's his name?" Your mom exclaimed

"Uh..." the wheels in your head turned rapidly as you tried to remember any guys you knew till you finally just let your word vomit slip out, "porco." 

"Mmh odd name but oh well. Have you been praying?" Your father asked, dropping the boy topic quicker than you expected

"No..." you considered lying but ultimately told the truth, the guilt of your other lie already weighing on you. You didn't have to look up to see the disappointment in their faces they sighed.

"Are you serious? Tch, if you're not gonna keep up with daily prayers then why should we continue to pay for school?" Your father threatened, your heart jumped at the threat knowing he'd have no problem saving thousands of dollars and keeping you locked back in that wretched town once again.

"No, i-I'm just studying a lot right now. I'll go today, i swear just- please don't..." you pleaded, holding back the lump in your throat. 

"Mhm, fine. The next i hear of you not praying I'll drive up to that school myself and drag you back home by the head." The last thing you heard was the ending of the call, your head still downcast facing the clenched fists in your lap. 

Sniffling away any straggling tears, you slammed your laptop shut and dropped your head into your hands, trying to regain control of your breathing. The creek of the door didn't faze you, neither did Pieck's rambling about something that happened t the store or whatever she was talking about, it was all too much. The clothes on your body felt restrictive, too tight, too close, too much. The room felt too small, too enclosed, like you were gonna suffocate. Her voice, too loud, too close, too much. It's all too much.

You had to get out.

Not bothering to say goodbye to Pieck, you snatched a pair of headphones and a hoodie from your desk and slammed the door shut. Starting up a random playlist, one of your favorite songs 'I Bet On Losing Dogs' by Mitski began humming in our ears as you stepping out of campus, not bothering to look back or even check where you were going. The busy streets, the constant horn honking, all the people walking back and forth, it was all new and foreign to you. Yet you couldn't be bothered to look up off the ground. Walking around aimlessly was always fun to you, when you were young an got lost in the woods, you felt...happy.

It was strange, a place that was always deemed scary and dangerous was always a place of comfort to you. The beach to others was the woods for you. A place to relax, to lay down and forget the problems of your real life. Strange yet comforting in a way you could never explain. 

Everybody used to think you were weird, not that you were denying tat you were a weird child because...well you were— but their perception of weird was not the sam as yours. To you, weird was a cockroach with three heads, weird was a modern day dinosaur being called a crocodile. To them, weird was a child who loved playing by herself in the woods, weird was a little girl who'd rather make 'potions' out of mud, bugs and sticks instead of playing dolls with the other girls. A wild child was what your grandma had referred to you as. Your grandfather was more on the mean religious side, your grandma was kind, accepting and never judged you for things she probably should have.

She passed away before you really needed her but you never forgot how freely she let you be. It was the first bit of freedom anybody had ever shown you. She let you ramble on about dreams of a world filled with mindless 15 meter humans that terrorized regular humans and ate them all alive, no matter how gross and in detail the story seemed, she never judged you. And for that, you would always be grateful for. That small piece of childhood, the small piece of freedom you go would stick with you forever.

Even if the monument in front of you claimed freedom, you would always tie freedom back to her. Mitski's angelic voice faded away in transition as a new song arose, a song you couldn't help but grasp onto. Hozier's famous 'Take Me To Church' began playing as you walked up the steps to the large white building. Only a few people sat spread out around the room, you silently made your way to the front of the room finding a seat and getting into a prayer position.

Yet nothing came to mind. What did you have to pray for?

_You lied._

You lied to your parents, 

_and you're lying to yourself_

The intrusive thoughts in your head began snapping back at you. Shaking your head, you tried forcing yourself to pray, to repent and apologize.

_you're wasting your time_

_you're thinking of her again_

In a moment of anger, you pinched your wrist trying to force yourself to stop. The familiar feeling of your eyes burning started up again.

_yelena_

_yelena_

_yelena_

_yelena_

"Shut up, shut up, shut up" you whispered harshly under your breath, pinching the skin between your nail harder

_you like her_

An almost silent gasp slipped out of your mouth at that tiny voice in your voice, shaking your head again you shut your eyes tightly. 

"i'm not gay"

_you like her_

"i'm not gay, i'm not gay..." you repeated to yourself, trying to alert anybody else of your intrusive thoughts

_you like yelena and there's nothing you can do about it_

"i'm not gay, i'm not gay, i'm not gay, i'm not gay" you repeated over and over agin, your legs pushing themselves up unconsciously and getting ready to leave until you felt someone crash right into you. 

"Watch i- woah, are you okay?"

You didn't even look to identify the person until a large hand wrapped around your wrist and pulled it towards themselves.

"Aren't you Pieck's roommate? What are you doing here? Why are you bleeding?" Your eyes finally raised up to meet the confused eyes of Porco who observed your wound with concern.

When you didn't answer, he pulled you away from the seats and towards a small back room. The medium spaced room held a single lightbulb that Porco pulled on and turned away from you to open a drawer, pulling out a standard first aid kit. A sharp pain on your wrist had finally caught up to you yet you couldn't bothered to let out a hiss of pain or even wipe away the stream of tears that had fallen without your knowledge.

"I'm not gonna ask if you're okay cause that's fucking stupid but...what happened?" Porco asked.

Honestly he didn't really know why he asked. He had no obligation to take care of your or even try to be your friend and, had to been any other person he would've left you there to mope by yourself but here he is. Taking care of some girl he barley knows.

 _'If only Hange and Pieck were here, they're better at this stuff'_ porco thinks to himself

Like a light went off in your head, you jumped into an upright position and snatched your hand away from the confused looking man.

"Did you...hear anything?" You asked hesitantly, but the guilty look on Porco's face that he tried to hide immediately after was answer enough for you. You sucked in a sharp breath and attempted to push past him to leave the room.

"Wait wait wait!" Porco put his hands on your shoulders to hold you back, "Okay yes I did but you weren't exactly quiet about it." Porco's words did nothing to ease your mind and you groaned and crouched down on the floor, using your arms as a headrest.

"I'm going to throw myself off a building." You mumbled to yourself, Porco sighed and sat down on the floor with you for a couple moments of silence before finally gathering his thoughts correctly.

"There's nothing wrong with being gay, y'know?" He mentioned, you scoffed and stood up again.

"I'm not gay." You said defensively, Porco looked up at you and sighed

"Whatever you say, dude." Anger bubble in your chest at his sarcasm

"Move out of my way, Porco." You demanded

"No." Porco defiled, shrugging his shoulder and staying in his position on the floor. 

"And why the hell not?"

"Because I'm trying to help."

"Help who?!" Your hands went up and down in annoyance

"You!" He exclaimed, you rolled your eyes and turned away from him with your arms crossed. "I'm not one for feelings but I'm also not a complete asshole. If you can't or won't accept yourself that's completely fine and up to you but I'm not gonna leave you here alone to deal with this." Porco explained passionately, you dropped your hands and craned your neck to look up at the old ceiling.

"Why?...why do you want to help me? You barley know me" Porco sighed from behind you and walked around you to face you directly.

"Because...well not everyone's a complete asshole and...Pieck would be mad if I didn't." He concluded, you chuckled at his excuses and nodded.

Porco leaned in and wiped your tears away, "I'm here if you need someone to talk to or just need a favor in general" he offered, you nearly brushed off his request until an idea popped into your head. Jumping in your stop you looked at him in excitement.

"That favor may come sooner than you think my dear friend." Porco raised an eyebrow at you suspiciously and back away

"And what exactly would this favor be?"

"Be my boyfriend." Porco scoffed at your request 

"Did we not just spend a good 10 minutes talking about accepting yourself?" He complained

"No, not my real boyfriend. I uh...kinda told my mom I have a crush on this guy names Porco and well...here you are. Perfect right?" You smiled at him, hoping you would be able to coerce him into your little scheme.

He sighed deeply and squinted his eyes at you, "The things I do for people...fine I'll help you." He finally agreed.

It was funny, really. Before this, you had never even considered you'd ever have this long of a conversation with Porco. He didn't seem like the approachable type and even Hange had trouble getting through to him, he was someone you never pictured yourself getting close to. Now while this wasn't the closest level of friendship there is, it was loyalty. A loyalty from him to you to keep a promise and secret.

Even throughout the entire walk back to the college the two of you just talked, wether it was about special interests or Porco catching you up on their group gossip he eavesdropped on, all of it came spilling out. Similar to your conversation with Hange, you felt like you could breathe and speak freely without worrying about saying something 'unladylike' as your mother put it. It was fun having a conversation where you didn't have to censor your words and Porco was definitely one who never had to censor his words.

Your stomach began hurting from how hard you were laughing, holding onto Porco's arm as the two of you laughed at his story. The two of you stopped outside of your room door.

"Alright, you've made it home okay, that's my cue to leave." Porco pointed out

"Thanks again, Porco. For...everything today." You thanked, he waved it off and shook his head

"No need to thank me, that's what friends do, right?" He bumped your shoulder, you nodded as he opened his arms, "Once in a lifetime opportunity, I don't give out hugs for free come on." You giggled and wrapped your arms around him, letting him do the same to you.

"Alright that's enough" Porco sighed, you pulled away from the hug and waved a goodbye at him as he walked away from your room, waving back at you. 

A pair of wandering eyes watched the interaction with interest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Posted on wattpad @/SUGACODED


	5. Guilty Conscience

  
SCHOOL WAS NOT YOUR FORTE. Hell, was school anyone's forte? It was one of the most draining and tiring exercises that was mandatory for some god forsaken reason. You believed humans should just sit around, sleep, eat, reproduce and call it a day— do it like they did in the old days. Then again, in the old days you didn't think they had to deal with molders day problems.

Well....your modern ay problems at least. But school was a good way to get in your moments of social interaction in, even if you didn't think you needed it. Humans were built to need and crave social interaction, it was science. So it was no surprise when you found yourself gravitating towards the long square table that occupied most of your friends. Zeke had books in front of him but didn't seem to be using it and instead spent that time on his phone, Yelenasitting right next to him but actually studying and makin casual conversation with Pieck who sat right across from her, to Yelena's right was a handsome dark skinned man who kept answering Hange's questions from across the table. To Pieck's right was a blonde man who sat between her and Hange trying to tell hange to lower their voice before they got kicked, and right across from Hange was Porco with a open seat next to him.

"Hey guys" you whispered, trying not to get the attention of the angry librarian again, Hange gasped at your arrival and excitedly jumped in their seat, motioning you to sit down. Porco, noticing your presence, smiled up at you and pulled open the seat next to him.

Ever since that night of the church last week, you and Porco and remained close. Now, while you didn't announce your little fake relationship to the world, you went to Porco after every phone call from your parents that nearly ended with you in tears over everything. School had been kicking you ass like no other meaning you barley had time to spend with anyone other than Pieck, Hange and Porco so it felt nice to finally catch your breath and talk to new people.

"Hey, how are you doing?" Porco asked, indirectly asking you how you felt after last night's conversation with your parents. While that one didn't end up in tears, it did end up with you trying to force yourself to invalidate your own questionable sexuality, you stayed with Porco till nearly 2 in the morning while he tried to reassure and validate everything you were feeling. Fun times.

"Hey, I'm good, thank you for last night." You replied, he nodded at your response and went back to focusing on his work. Hange smiled widely at you, as per usual.

"Guys this my friend" they called the attention of everyone at the table besides Yelena who kept her head in her books and introduced you. "This is Onyankopon and Moblit, my right hand man." You smiled at them politely and waved.

"Nice to meet you, I'm surprised Hange hasn't scared you off yet." Onyankopon joked, Hange gasped in offense. You chuckled and looked towards the end of the table.

"Hey roomie, what were you doing at Porco's so late last night?" Pieck asked, leaning her head on her hand and glancing over at Yelena.

"Oh...he was helping me study, Mr. Erwin does not mess around when it comes to grades." You lied with a scoff, trying to look over to Yelena but only being met with her gaze still facing down.

"I had Erwin last year, he's not all bad. But if you try a lot in his class, he'll definitely give you extra points for trying." Zeke spoke up, looking up from his phone to assign his two cents.

"Didn't you almost fail Erwins class last year?" Yelena finally spoke up, Zeke made a face of annoyance towards her

"Seriously? Do you always have to ruin my moments?" He complained, everyone chuckled at their little banter yet you wanted more. You tried to call the attention of Yelena with no such luck, she just wouldn't lift her damn head unless it was directed at Zeke, Pieck or Onyankopon.

For some odd reason the topic of relationships had been brought up, Zeke bein the boaster that he is tried to outshine everyone but definitely didn't get the reaction he'd expected.

"You didn't get your first kiss till you were like 18, lower you voice." Yelena called him out, you snorted and slapped you hand over your mouth, trying not to laugh. Hange did not care and let out a roar of laughter with Pieck following and Porco trying to hide that laugh that was building up.

"Sometimes i seriously regret being friends with you, you know?" Zeke deadpanned

"Welcome to the party." Yelena mumbled.

"What about you, Onyankopon? Any special ladies in line?" Asked Pieck, the male looked up from his studies and rubbed the bac of his neck nervously with a chuckle.

"Only one. We've been dating for almost 6 years now." Everyone's mouths dropped at his answer

"Jesus christ, man. At least invite us to the wedding." Zeke joked, the man chuckled in embarrassment at how shocked his friends were.

"Why are you guys so surprised?"

"Honestly you're super attractive, i just thought you'd have a bunch of girls lined up." You spoke up, everyone nodded at your answer since its what they were all thinking.

"Oh i do. But i only want one." He said lovingly, everyone at the table aw'd at his cheesiness an display of pure love. 

Hange groaned and slammed their head dramatically down on the table, "Ugh, i wish i had a love that sweet." Hange moaned out dramatically

"Hange....you have a boyfriend." Pieck said with a 'seriously?' look on her face.

Hange perked up as her mouth made an 'o' shape. "Oh yeah..." they suddenly remembered, Porco shook his head and pinche the bridge of his nose

"Wait, Hange you have a boyfriend? Who?" You asked, this being a realization for the both of you.

"Me"

"Him" they both spoke at the same time, pointing to the blonde boy who had introduced himself as Moblit earlier. You were surprised for a moment due to their completely different personalities.

"Yeah we get that look a lot." Moblit mentioned

"Huh?"

"That surprised look you have right now, i get it though. We're completely different people but without me, i don't think Hange would be a functional human being in society." Moblit explained, not even kidding on the last part. Hange nodded happily and wrapped their arms around him, shaking him wildly.

"What about you? Are you in a relationship?" Hange asked you, after nearly shaking her lover out of his chair and now drawing everyone's attention on you.

"Mhm? No, definitely not." You shook your head, dismissing her question yet letting your eyes drift off to meet Porco's for split second, the both of you looking away to not draw attention to yourselves.

"Mmh sure, you can tell me the truth later." Hange teased, patting you head. You rolled your eyes playfully at them and stood up from your seat.

"Where are you going?" Porco asked

"Relax, I'm just gonna put this back." You said, grabbing your Alice in Wonderland book and heading towards the section you found it in the last time.

Carefully slipping the old worn out book in its respective place, you sighed sadly at having to leave behind such an amazing book. Your eyes scanned more fantasy books as your mind raced with thoughts of how excited you were to finally be able to read one of the many things your parents forbade you from reading. You became so immersed in your thoughts again that you didn't even hear the heavy footsteps coming closer and closer to you until a hand tapped you on the shoulder.

"Hey." You jumped at the sudden interruption and turned around to find the boy you'd met on your first day standing in front of you. "Sorry, didn't mea to scare you."

"Oh it's fine. Do you need something?" You asked politely

"You're Pieck's roommate, right?" You nodded and became suspicious as he took a step forward, "Can you do me a favor?"

"Uh...that depends on what kind of favor you're asking."

"Can you try to convince Pieck to come to my party on Friday?" He silently begged, you pulled your eyebrows together in confusion.

"Why don't you just ask her yourself?"

"Because she'll just say no but you are her...what? Best friend, right? I'll even extend the invitation"Eren probed, trying to convince you even further.

"Why do you want Pieck to go to your party so bad?" You questioned, crossing your arms over your chest. Considering the fact that Eren and Zeke were half brothers and had most likely known Pieck longer than you have, Eren's behavior was just weird.

"Because...shit uh you see, your darling Pieck is like one of the hottest girls in this school, so more people are likely to come to my party if i tell them that shes going. More people...more girls...more alcohol...you see where I'm going with this?" He explained.

Before you could open your mouth to respond, you felt a warm hand slide over your shoulders and lean against you.

"Going with what?" Asked the very person your were speaking about

"Pieck! Fancy seein you here, what a coincidence." Eren laughed sarcastically, awkwardly leaning against a nearby bookshelf

"Mhm, why are you talking to her, Eren?" Eren gulped at Pieck's protectiveness and let out a vibration between his lips.

"Pfft just...catching up, you know?"

"Walk away before i make you, Yeager." Pieck threatened, Eren whined and gave you a hopeful look before sauntering off.

Despite Eren being about 6'1, and Pieck being only 5'0, the height difference did nothing to stop the intimidation radiating off of her. Clearly, he was used to her threats which made you question how long they have actually known each other. After Eren had fled the scene, Pieck took her arm off of you and leaned against the bookshelf in front of you.

"What did that little shit say to you?" She asked with a raised eyebrow, you chuckled and shook your head. 

"He didn't say anything weird, i promise." Pieck gave you a suspicious look before shrugging and letting it go.

"So...how are you doing?" You looked over at her in confusion

"Fine, why?"

"No reason. You just...seem to be spending more time with Porco than with your own roommate." She pouted, reaching her hand out to brush away anything around your forehead, reminding you of the last time you were in the library with... "I miss you." 

You blinked at her, not realizing how much time you had actually spent with Porco recently. "Sorry, i guess I didn't realize how long it'd been. I've just been so slumped with school and-"

"So tell me next time, I'm not your roommate for no reason. I'm here if you need help with anything." She said reassuringly, dropping her hand down to meet yours shyly.

"I know its just...Porco's been helping me study a lot, i guess i forgot." You said leaning your head against the bookshelf as well, feeling her hand squeeze yours at the mention of the gel coated blonde.

"Are you guys dating?" She blatantly asked, your mouth dropped slightly at her assumption. "Don't look so shocked. Can you blame me? I mean...you guys have been super close lately and he's like...actually tolerating you unlike most people so" she shrugged

"I see where you're coming from uh...i mean, kinda?" You said uncertainly, not sure if you were ready to spill out all your insecurities and secrets to her in the middle of the library.

"Is that a question or an answer?"

"Both?" The two of you lightly chuckled at your joke, "it's complicated" you left it at that. Pieck nodded understandingly and looked back.

"You know, if I didn't know any better I'd think you have a crush on Yelena instead." She mocked, yet you couldn't seem to sense a hint of sarcasm in her voice.

And for that moment of silence, you felt guilty. Guilty because even though Yelena had told you they weren't together, it was more than likely possible that Pieck had a crush on her. I mean, you knew if you were ever intimate with anyone multiple times while not being labeled as a relationship, you'd feel at least a little jealous at the sight of them flirting with one of your friends.

"We're gonna be heading to a coffee shop soon, lets go." Pieck tugged your hand that she hadn't let go of and pulled back towards the direction you came from.

Coming back to the table you noticed the absence of Moblit and Onankopon were not at the table while Hange, Porco, Zeke and Yelena were packing up their things. The only person who'd noticed you and Pieck's arrival had been Hange, who perked up at the sight of you two, and Yelena who stared at your intertwined hands before turning back around to Zeke.

"Hey guys, Moblit went with Onyankopon to get the car, you coming with us?" Hange asked, you looked over at Pieck to see if she was going with you but her attention was focused on another person.

"Pieck riding with us." Yelena called out, throwing Zeke the car keys and throwing her satchel over her shoulder. Pieck gave you an apologetic look and let go of your hand.

"Alright, looks like you're stuck with us." Hange exclaimed, wrapping her arms around both you and Porco and pushing your heads close together. Porco groaned and pulled out of her grip.

You tried to take a last glance over at Yelena and Pieck but could barley make out where they were as Hange interlocked all three of your hands together and pulled you out of the library like you were in kindergarten. Once you made it to the car, you relaxed into the warm seats, the new fall air not doing anybody any favors and the sunlight being no help either. The car ride would've been silent had it not been for Hange's constant rambling yet you were grateful, it kept all the attention off you and left you to your thoughts.

"You okay?" Porco whispered, tapping you shoulder. You turned your head to look at him and nodded unconvincingly. "I thought we'd gotten over this whole shy thing, tell me what's up."

"It's nothing...really. Well, nothing I understand anyway." You whispered, Porco nodded understandingly and put his arm around you.

"Let me know when you figure it out or when you decide to finally get a therapist cause I have the number of really good one who I think—" you clicked your teeth and rolled your eyes, playfully pushing Porco away as he laughed at your reaction. Hange looked at you two through the rear view mirror with a smile as Moblit pulled into one of the only parking spots on the road near cute little coffee shop.

With the car shut off, everybody began shuffling out and waiting on the sidewalk for Yelena and the rest to make their way here. Just as they pulled in, their car was filled loud music and badly sounding singing, likely coming from Zeke. Once Zeke double parked, your eyes couldn't help but fall upon where Yelena and Pieck came out, the tall woman leaning down to whisper something in your roommates ear. But you had already made up your mind.

"Hey, where are you going?" Hange asked, noticing you separate from Porco to go back to Zeke's car.

You didn't answer them and walked over to Zeke's car where he stood standing next to the drivers door with Yelena.

"Uh hey." You made your presence known, "Can I talk to Yelena for a second?" Zeke looked over at you in slight shock before nodding and throwing his keys over to Yelena who caught it with perfect ease.

"Get in the passenger side while I look for parking." She said, not giving you enough time to respond before entering the car. You looked over to the group walking away in the distance and noticed your dark haired roommate looking back at the two of you for a second, turning back around once she noticed your staring.

The plush seat felt warm under your bottom as the seat warmers kicked in, Yelena wasted no time in driving out of the double parking and began looking around the block for any unoccupied spaces. 

"Are you gonna sit there like a scared little bunny the whole time or are we gonna talk?" Yelena asked suddenly, you took a deep breath and finally figured out the question that had been itching your brain for the past hour.

"Right uh...are you...ignoring me?" Yelena's face didn't change from her usual bored expression except for the twitch of a smirk that threatened to be let out.

"What? Can't live without my attention, darling?" She teased cockily

"Tch, no." Was your failed attempt at defense but you weren't finished. "Where were you last week?"

Yelena turned her head to look at you for a moment before turning back to the road, "Is this an interrogation or something?" 

"Please just answer the question" you sighed

"Fine. Mmmh I was out of town last week with Zeke, we came back around...Saturday I think, early in the morning in case you were gonna ask." She answered tapping her fingers on the steering wheel, you furrowed your eyebrows at her answer,

The on,y reason you were asking was because you thought she'd seen you and Porco that night after the church. Whoever was eavesdropping definitely wasn't trying to hide their presence but you didn't see their face, and with the way Yelena had been giving you the cold shoulder today, it wasn't out of pocket to think she'd witnessed it.

"Why do you ask?"

"...No reason. Sorry for the interrogation." You apologized,

"It's fine, you know you can come to me for anything, kitten." Yelena dragged on, placing her arm behind your seat and craning her torso to turn around to see where she was parking. With her face now inches away from yours, a previous conversation between you and Porco seemed to pop into your head.

Maybe you are a little gay

"You know, nobody else looks at me like that." Yelena blurted out suddenly, her minty breath hitting your nose softly. 

"What? How do I look at you?" You asked, she smirked and turned off the car, leaning back in the drivers seat.

"Like...you're curious about something. You wanna kiss me or something?" She teased, pulling out a metal lighter from her pocket and a small zip lock bag that contained a pre-rolled blunt. Lighting up the drug, she took in a sharp breath as you watched her.

"You're doing it again." She pointed out.

Still starstruck, Yelena's long cold finger grabbed your cheeks, squishing them together slightly and blowing the air into your face.

As intimate as the moment was, you couldn't help the strong itch in your throat that crept up as you inhaled your shared air, coughing it out. You pushed open the passenger side door to catch your breath, hearing Yelena let out a small laugh at your state and step out of the car as well.

"Why am I not surprised you've never smoked?" Yelena chuckled out, as you met her on the sidewalk and began making you way towards the coffee shop.

"Who said I've never smoked?" You defended, finally reaching the outside of the shop.

Yelena raised an eyebrow at you unconvinced and held out the blunt to you. In a minute of hesitation, Yelena smirked and leaned in closer to you, grabbing your chin and lifting it upward. 

"Don't hurt yourself, baby." She whispered, you pouted and pulled your face away from her hand and crossed your arms over your chest. "Call Zeke over for me"

You rolled your eyes and opened the glass door, the light bell ringing above your head signaling to everyone that you had entered. Soon enough, your eyes found the booth everyone was seated at. 

"Hey, I ordered you your favorite and a croissant." Pieck spoke up, noticing you walking up to the seats.

"Thanks, Pieck. Zeke, Yelena wants to see you outside." You brought up, the blonde nodded and got up.

Once Zeke left, you sat down on the plush red booths the coffee shop provided and thanked Pieck as she handed you your drink. You listened intently as everyone spoke, wether it was school, family, or personal moments, you all listened to each other. It was nice having people listen. People always said to steer clear of big groups of friends and maybe they were right but, for now you couldn't help but immerse yourself in the moment. A moment of friendship. A moment you never got to experience before.

Warmth encompassed your chest as the thought passed and a warm head leaned on your shoulder, looking down you noticed Pieck leaning her head on your shoulder as her eyes began to droop. And a sudden favor popped into your head.

"Psst, Pieck." She hummed, letting you know she was listening, "do you wanna go to a party on Friday?"

Outside, two blondes stood passing a blunt back and forth. One blond stared through the large glass windows at the two distant customers who seemed a little closer than usual while the other blonde watched his friend in amusement. 

"You're down bad, Yelena." Zeke joked, Yelena rolled her eyes.

"Shut up, Zeke." The woman muttered, snatching the blunt out his hand as he chuckled at her reaction.

"I mean...do you even know her name?"

"...Of course I know her name." Yelena defended, Zeke raised his eyebrows at her waiting for the woman to finish her sentence but busted out laughing at her silence. 

"Choke."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lmk how you think of this chapter and reminder that this story is also posted on wattpad at SUGACODED.


	6. I Met Sarah in the Bathroom

**I MET SARAH IN THE BATHROOM — awfultune**

  
"PLEASE PIECK" you whined, your dark haired roommate rolled her eyes and flopped onto her bed

"Not happening, babes." She replied, completely turning down your offer. You threw yourself on your bed and stretched out dramatically.

"But I've never been, it's not fair." You complained, Pieck sat up and looked over to you suspiciously

"Why do you want me to go to a party so bad? Especially one being hosted by Eren fucking Jaeger."

"Well who else has parties around here?" You sat up as well and faced her side of the room, "Besides, what's wrong with Eren Jeager? He's Zeke's brother, isn't he? He can't be all that bad."

"Half-brother. Zeke and Eren are...the weirdest sibling I've ever met. Zeke is on the more thoughtful side, he thinks before doing anything, a business man for sure and has a more realistic outlook on life. Eren, on the other hand is impulsive, a little naive but not stupid, and has all the qualities of a teenage boy despite being 19 already." Pieck explained thoroughly

"How did you guys become friends?"

"Middle school. Eren was still young but we went to the same playground and one day, as I'm casually playing in the sandbox, this two year old boy comes up to me and just throws sand in my face unprovoked. And as any 10 year old does, I started bawling my eyes out and this other boy, much other than us runs over at pushes his brother out the way to help me out of the sandbox. Eren didn't know what was happening at the time but even when he grew up and found out, the little shit laughed about it." Pieck cursed, you tightened your lips into a straight line to stop the laugh that nearly escaped.

"How long have you guys been friends?" You asked curiously

"Too long. Zeke and Yelena have been friends since she came out of the womb though. Zeke even delayed going to college because he didn't go wanna go in alone." The two of you laughed.

"Speaking of Yelena....what are you guys?" You questioned, Pieck paused and began playing with her hair, "Sorry if I'm intruding, I just—"

"No no no, you're good I just..I don't know. I mean I guess the technical term would be friends with benefits, no?"

"I think so. Do you like her? If you do, i think you guys have a chance...y'know together." You felt your heart squeeze at the words coming out of your mouth but didn't stop yourself.

Bad habits. They were harder to break than most people would think. While some people are selfish with claiming their territory on a person they hold interest in, you most definitely did not participate in said claiming. You preferred to sit on the sidelines, give advice to someone else, boost their confidence and help them ask out the person you wanted all along. Bad habits, if only it were that easy to get rid of. Maybe then you'd stop breaking your heart.

"I used to. I don't know if I still do. Crushes are hard like that, you know?" Pieck shrugged

"Um...no, not really." Her dark eyes widened at your answer, she scoffed and threw the pillow she was holding at you.

"Bullshit. You're telling me you've never had a crush on anyone?" You shook your head and slammed your head down on the pillow. "What about Porco? You two seem to be close recently."

"Oh! No, definitely not Porco haha..." you laughed nervously, Pieck snorted and raised her eyebrows high.

"Whatever you say." You threw the pillow back to her

"Shut up, I'm serious." Giggling at each other, you rolled your head and crossed your arms over your chest. "Porco's just been helping me out with a couple things recently, nothing serious. Oh but if my parents ask we're dating."

Pieck flinched back with a weirded out look on her face before bursting out laughing. Her soft angelic laugh filling the room.

"What? Why?" She asked through her continuous laughter

"No reason."

After a couple beats of silence and Pieck getting over her laugh attack, she stood up off her bed and walked closer to you. Standing in front of you as you sat on the bed, she placed her hands on your shoulders.

"You know you can tell me anything, right? We haven't been friends that long but I- we all care about you. Besides, you might drive Porco crazy for making him feel so many emotions." She said sternly, still looking into your eyes. Nodding at her words, Pieck leaned in to pull you into a hug that ended up in the both of you toppling over on your bed.

Once again, laughter filled the room as she fell on top of you, almost hitting her head against the nearby wall and letting out a dramatic shout. You felt your cheeks heat up as the feeling of bubbled in your chest, not even realizing how close the two on you were until you forced the cheeky grin on your face and the urge to laugh out of your system. The pair of you stared into each other's eyes, neither making a move to get up or switch positions.

The sweet smell of Pieck's green apple scented shampoo and conditioner hit your nose, even the jolly ranchers she'd previously eaten hit you at the proximity. It was new. Being this close to someone. The only other person you'd ever been this close to was....

The face that popped into your head had you turning you head to the side, mentally trying to get her out of your head. Pieck blinked got up off you, choosing to sit right besides you on your bed.

"Pieck..." she immediately perked up, "can I ask you something?"

"Yes of course, anything."

"Can you come to a party with me?"

Bad ideas. You weren't unfamiliar with them. Quite frankly, you would consider bad ideas to be your best friend. But maybe this was your worst idea. Honestly, you'd never even attended a party that wasn't church mandatory or a family function of some sort, and even then you wouldn't choose the outfit, it was given. You never thought you'd actually have to go dress shopping for some college party.

Your wonderful roommate had finally agreed to go to the party after a while of begging and a promise to not get blackout drunk and throw up everywhere, a simple deal on your part. Pieck described your closet as "where are all the cute stuff?" And "my dog has better dresses than this" so, naturally she took you shopping.

It felt awkward but a little fun. Your mother's version of "mother daughter time" was buying new church dresses and drinking a sip of soda as a treat. Not the worst but definitely did not leave your standards as high as they should've been. What did raise your standards was modern media.

Movies like Mean Girls, Clueless and many other old classics that your mother would've yanked your hair out for watching really set the standard for how you wanted to look when you go older. In freshman year was when you met a girl, she was in no way religious or pretentious like everyone else in town and often times was given lots of freedom by her parents. While this did not side well with the gossipers of the town, it never bothered you and the two of you quickly became friends. The one weekend out of the month your parents allowed you to go to her house would be filled with sleepless nights, hundreds of carbs due to ice creams, sodas and other sugary snacks. She left shortly after moving there due to the constant berating from local townsfolk but you were always grateful that she was someone in your life who made you feel a little cooler and happier in a dull town.

"Ooh this is cute." Pieck held up a little red dress, your eyes scanning around it.

"Where's the rest of it?" You asked,

"The rest will be made up for with legs and ass." Pieck exclaimed with a smile, you raised your eyebrows at her.

"Both of which I do not have." The short woman groaned and placed the dress back on the hook

"Mhm, I disagree and stop doing that." She demanded

"What am I doing?"

"Stop degrading yourself. You need to start giving yourself positive affirmations." You pressed your lips into a thin line, "Speak it into a existence and it will always come back to you. See, I think you're gorgeous but since you keep bring yourself down, you have low self confidence. Think about it." She explained, pointing her finger to her temple. You nodded at her words and pat her on the shoulder, turning her away from the mini dress section of the store.

"Let's go find another dress, yeah?" Pieck pouted but followed you as you looked around to try to find something you liked, subtly picking up dresses she found cute so she could make you try them on later.

With many 'oohs' and 'ahs' coming from Pieck, she had finally collect over 5 different dresses for you to try on. Shoving you into the change room and dropping down on the plush pink couch in the waiting room, the dark haired woman watched in excitement as you came out in the first dress. A strapless little red dress that was a quarter inch away from falling.

"Do you want me to flash everyone at the party?" You asked sarcastically,

"Depends, do you want a boyfriend?" Pieck teased, rolling your eyes and walking back into the dressing room, a new saga of you hating of the outfits presented to you as Pieck tried to raise your confidence.

Finally, you came out with the last dress. "Can I just wear jeans and a nice shirt or something?" you whined

"No. This is your first real party where you can be an adult and feel hot about it." Pieck encouraged

"Yeah well these skin tight dresses that have my tits spilling out of them every time isn't exactly making me feel hot. I feel like a sausage that's about to burst." Sighing, you noticed the concentrated look on the short woman's face before she held up one finger.

"I have an idea." After a few minutes of waiting, the pale girl came back with an excited smile on her face as she skipped over to you. There she held up the outfit.

"Put this on."

In the dressing room, you put on the plain white short sleeve shirt and slipped the spaghetti strap silk sage green dress over it, the top of the dress resting under your boob area as the length of the dress reached your mid calf. The smooth fabric was warm against your skin, not too tight fitting to where it made you uncomfortable but not too loose it made you look boxy.

Pieck gasped as you came out of the dressing room.

"Oh my god, you look so pretty! I'm a genius!" She exclaimed proudly, you nodded and shrugged since you couldn't really disagree. The outfit did make you feel hot.

Even though she'd been excited to do your hair, you informed Pieck that you'd rather do it yourself as you didn't like people touching your hair. Thankfully, you already had a hairstyle planned and prepared beforehand so you didn't waste any extra time getting started on it once you got home. Pairing your preplanned outfit with a pair of simple white air forces, you sprayed a couple sprits of your favorite perfume and turned around to check if your roommate was ready.

Dressed in a black sweetheart neckline dress with sheer puffy pink sleeves, a white lace garter on her right thigh and tall platform pink heels with fluff at the bottom, Pieck came out.

"Wow, look at you. Ready for the red carpet with those platforms." You joked, your once short roommate finally got a couple inches to height and spun around excitedly, watching her dress spin with her.

"When am I not red carpet ready is the question?" She boasted, throwing her hair over her shoulder for added dramatic effect

"Should I show you what you look like in the morning now or later?" Pieck gasped, and slapped your arm playfully.

"Hey! That is confidential information." She argued jokingly, you chuckled and held your hand out to her

"Let's party." 

Trust Eren to have the outdone decorations outside of his house. Young adults piling in and out of the house, overfilling it with so many people you could feel your future self getting lost in it. Many people waved and shouted over at Pieck as the two of you entered, some even came up to give her a hug or hand her drink, awkwardly introducing themselves after noticing your presence. But it didn't seem to bother you. Your eyes were more focused on the enormous frat house you'd just entered.

Sweaty bodies gliding past you, red solo cups filled with who knows what nearly spilling onto your dress and suddenly, a warm hand slipped into yours.

"Cmon" Pieck motioned over to a back room, one everyone else didn't seem to make a pass at opening as a tall largely built man stood in front of it with his arms crossed over his chest and his bushy eyebrows furrowed together.

"Where are we going?" You asked

"The basement. Trust me you don't wanna be here when the clock strikes twelve, not a good time." You nodded at her words and followed her silently as she walked up to the guard at the front confidently.

"Hey Reiner." She greeted him casually, he dropped his angry facade once noticing her.

"Pieck, finally you're here. My feet hurt." The man complained

"Oh you poor baby. Anyways, this is my roommate, the one I told you about." She mentioned, lifting her hand up to your shoulder. The man, Reiner looked over at you and nodded.

"Nice to meet you." He greeted, you repeated the words back and watched as he opened the wood colored door, letting the two of you walk inside first before locking it behind him.

Noticing your confused and slightly worried expression, Pieck tapped you on the shoulder. "Relax. Only specifically invited people are allowed in the basement. Levi said he needs to separate the pigs from the birds, whatever that means." You nodded at her words, not recognizing the name she said but not bothering asking.

Once you reached the bottom of the stairs, there you saw a small group of people scattered around the room — some playing pool, others sitting on the couch and talking casually. On the far back of the room was a mini bar where you saw a familiar face waving their hands wildly as they spoke with an unamused black haired man behind the counter.

"Hey guys!" Everyone turned their head and let out a loud cheer of Pieck's name, many of the women coming up to crush her into a hug — leaving you standing there awkwardly.

"Hey!" A voice called out. Flashes of brown clouded your vision as someone crashes into you, but by the infamous ponytail swinging in your face, you already knew who it was.

"Hey Hange, didn't expect you to be here." Hange pulled away from the hug and grabbed your hand, pulling you over to where she was seated before

"Oh I know, I don't usually come to parties but I thought my best friend Levi here would need some help dealing with these rowdy kids tonight." Hange explained quickly, the man behind the counter who you assumed to be Levi sucked his teeth.

"I don't need your help, Hange." Levi grumbled, wiping down the counter.

"Don't listen to him. Anyways, how've you been? Any new life updates?" Hange asked curiously, leaning her cheek onto her closed fist.

"Not really I um..." a loud bang cut you off as everyone turned their attention towards the staircase as more people made their way down.

"Reiner, quit locking that door you fucking twat!" Complained a familiar deep voice, leaning back in your seat, your eyes landed on the tall woman who'd been on your mind for hours. Zeke right behind her and a loud annoyed groan coming from Eren.

Yelena never failed to take your breath away. There she stood, dressed in a nice suit with the first couple buttons of her blouse let open. If you weren't sitting down, you were sure you would've fallen over at the sight. Never did you think someone could make you feel this way.

Her hand swung around the couch to land a slap on the back Reiner's head, the noise echoing in the room despite the music playing. This sent two of the people playing pool into a fit of laughter, a brown haired boy and girl drunkly stumbled onto each other as jokes began spilling from their lips, only causing them to laugh even harder. Two blonde men behind them sighed.

You chuckled at the two before your eyes landed back on the woman who now finally noticed your stare and returned it with a mischievous smirk painted across her lips. Her longs legs strutted over to where you were seated, coming up next to Hange.

"Hello fellow partiers, having a good evening, I presume?" Yelena greeted, ordering a drink from Levi. Her dark eyes making their way back to you.

"Hey Yelena, nice suit." Hange complimented

"Thanks. Just came out of business meeting and Zeke wanted to pop in here to get a drink."

"Great, another drunken bastard to clean up after." Levi complained angrily, Yelena raised her eyebrows up at him and turned back to the two of you, making a motion to call him crazy. You chuckled.

A dirty blonde haired boy rushed up to the counter out of breath, "Uh Levi, Hange, we may...have a little itty bitty problem." The boy pinched his index finger and his thumb together.

"What is it now, Jean?" Levi sighed

"Um...Connie might've...accidentally...got his hand stuck in the speaker...again." He rushed out his last words, the two adults sighed and looked behind Jean to see Connie sitting on the floor with his hand in the speaker and a whine coming out his mouth while another brown haired girl in a ponytail was laughing at him. The glass in the girl's hand slipped as she tripped over her own feet, her body landing into a worried blonde haired arms.

"I'll get the broom." Levi announced

"I'll get the butter." Hange stated, the three leaving very quickly soon after.

Yelena chuckled at the scene and took the seat Hange was previously sitting at, her knee brushing up against yours due to her tall stature. Those big dark eyes of hers never leaving you.

"So, what have you been up to, kitten?" The nickname sent a shiver down your spine, reminding you of the last time the two of you were close together.

"Huh? Oh nothing just...around." You shrugged, Yelena hummed and brought the drink up to her lips.

"Around shopping?"

"What?"

"The dress. Never thought I'd see you wearing one but...damn you look good." Yelena complimented, her eyes scanning you up and down. You felt your cheeks become hot and a smile trying to welcome itself onto your face, you fake coughed into your elbow and the blonde woman laughed.

"So, what have you been up to? We never talk about you." You asked, leaning your head on your hand.

"Ah come on now, I've been trying to play this whole mysterious hot stranger act for a little while longer." Yelena joked, you giggled and rolled your eyes.

"Yeah well you can drop the act now." She tilted her head at you and sighed

"Mhm to answer to your question, me and Zeke have been going to a bunch of business meetings trying to build more relationships with people in power. Zeke already has connections to some crazy ass people, it's kind of interesting honestly." As she finished speaking, Yelena looked over to you and saw you sitting there with an unamused look on your face.

"What?"

"You know that's not what I wanna wear about, Yelena." Ignoring the fluttering in her chest at her name leaving your lips, Yelena leaned back into her chair.

"What are you talking about?"

"If I wanted to talk about what Zeke's doing in his life, I'd go talk to him. I don't wanna hear about Zeke...I wanna hear about you. What you're like, your favorite color, what you did on the weekend, your hobbies, something— anything about you!" You argued, Yelena looked and felt taken aback by your sudden outburst, not even realizing what she'd been doing this whole time.

"Ooh trust me, you don't wanna know what I was doing this weekend." She winked at you, "...Painting. My hobby is painting."

"Really? What kind of things to do you paint?" You inquired, leaning closer. Yelena opened her mouth to answer and coughed into her hand to hide the laugh bubbling up.

"People. I draw people. More specifically women....of the nude variety." She explained and you nodded understandingly.

"Oh, what made you start painting?" Yelena copied your stance and leaned in, holding her head up with her hand.

"My first girlfriend."

"Were you in love with her?"

"No. No definitely not but, she was the first woman I'd ever been with after coming out. A learning experience, for sure but I'm glad I painted her while I still had the chance." Your face dropped into confusion, "She died." She said bluntly, your eyes widened.

"Oh god I-I'm so sorry." You stuttered, not expecting what came out of her mouth. Yelena chuckled and waved her arm dismissively.

"It's okay. I'm just grateful I got that experience of being with a woman, especially first coming out, she really pushed me to grow as a person." She concluded, your eyes never left her face as a strong sense of longing brittled deep within your chest.

"I envy you"

"Why?"

"Because you're free." You confessed. Yelena's face grew confused at your words.

"How am I free?" Yelena questioned, you sighed.

"You don't have to worry about hiding yourself to the most important people in your life. The people that are supposed to love you no matter what. Well...that's a load bullshit now, isn't it?" She didn't respond, choosing to listen intently to your words, "Apparently 'no matter what' doesn't actually mean no matter what."

With no more words to say, Yelena just gazed at you. Scanning you from top to bottom, she couldn't seem to figure why anyone wouldn't be absolutely enamored by you. Your eyes, your lips, your nose, your skin, your hands, your everything — it didn't have to be perfect for everyone, she didn't want you to be the beauty standard, to be some porcelain little doll that was so fragile everyone would just stare. She just wanted you. You, yourself, your problems, and your love— she didn't want to share that with anyone else. She didn't want to share you with anyone else.

"You need a drink?" She finally spoke up, holding out her drink in front of your face. You giggled and shrugged.

"Sure, why not?"

Raising your hand up to hold the cup, Yelena gently put them down and held the glass cup up to your lips. You wrapped your lips around the cup and tilted your head back, the ice nearly hitting your lips. Yelena pulled the cup away once you finished and laughed at the sour expression of your face.

"Bleh, what is that?" You coughed out

"Our future."

"Huh? I've never heard of that." You queried, Yelena smirked at your cluelessness and downed the rest of it after you.

"It's Sex on The Beach." She slammed the drink down after finishing it and began laughing at your surprised expression.

Her long cold hand reached over and landed on your cheek, her thumb swiping across your bottom lip as you laid there unmoving. Once her thumb has finished swiping itself across, she pulled her hand away and licked off the juices on her thumb, maintaining eye contact the entire time.

"Can't waste any." Yelena teased, you crossed your legs together to relieve your nervousness.

Even by now you knew the tension between you couldn't even be cut. At this moment, you didn't believe anyone could pull you away from her. Yelena was everything you dreamed of, everything any woman wanted in their bed, everything you never thought you'd have — yet here she was, with you.

"Um guys" you turned around and was face with a red faced Porco holding up a nearly passed out Pieck by the waist, her upper half facing downward.

"Oh my god, Pieck. Porco, what happened?" You jumped off the bar seat and cupped Pieck's face in your hands, lifting her head up to get her dark hair out of face. Her usually pale face was now bright red as sweat gleamed on her forehead, sticking locks of hair onto it.

"She went upstairs for a drink, came back like this. Might be high though." Porco explained.

Suddenly, Pieck stood up, looking around wildly until her eyes landed on you. Throwing herself onto you, she sighed and wrapped her arms around you loosely.

"Heyyy, rommie! I'm not drunk, high, yes but I only had like..." she scratched her head and held up her fingers like a child, "five shots."

"Five shots of what, Pieck?" Yelena spoke up, Pieck lifted up her head again.

"Oh hey Lena, didn't see you there? When did you get here?" She slurred her words. You sighed and pulled her away, holding her at an arms length.

"Pieck! What did you drink?"

"Um...vodka? No! It was a screwdriver, ha!" She raised one finger in the air proudly before dropping her head down again.

Yelena stood up and pulled her head back gently, feeling her forehead. "Okay and who gave you the drink?"

"Your hands are cold..." she mumbled, leaning her head closer to Yelena's hand

"Pieck!" Porco groaned, tired of her constant topic changes

"Fine! geez...Annie gave it to me. We were having a drink off with Colt and Floch...we won if you wondering"

"We weren't." Porco mumbled, Pieck pouted at him and rolled her eyes.

"Why is that not surprising?" Yelena said at the same time, you sighed.

"C'mon, help me get her upstairs and to the bathroom." You wrapped Pieck's arm around yourself, Yelena doing the same. Reaching into Pieck's pocket, you pulled out her car keys. "Here Porco, get her car and bring it around front so we don't have to walk up the block to get it." Porco nodded at your instructions and went in front of you to leave.

It was only when you reached the top of the stairs and open the basement door that you realized how many people were packed into the house, and the drunken girl on your shoulder was no help. You gave Yelena and exasperated look and began your string of 'excuse me' and 'sorry' as you pushed past people.

"Oh god, I think I'm gonna puke." Pieck moaned, you and Yelena looked at each other wide eyed.

"fuck this. Alright everyone out of the way, move it!" Yelena shouted, using her height to pushed people out the way quicker. "Ooh is that a dog?"

"Yelena!" You exclaimed, she apologized and went back to shuffling everyone out of the way.

Once you made it the luminous, white tiled bathroom, the dark haired girl hanging on your arm immediately detached herself from you and bolted towards the toilet. Emptying the contents of her stomach, you rushed over to hold her hair back as Yelena stood at the doorway.

"Can you get some water?" You asked, rubbing Pieck's back.

"Water? In a college party? In a frat house at that?" Yelena leered, the thought walking around the sweaty body infested lake of hormones sending her into disgust.

"Just try, please." You sighed, Yelena mentally kicked herself at your cute expression and turned around to go on a quest for water in a frat house, one she'd now consider looking for water in a desert.

Pieck groaned and blindly grabbed at some toilet paper, folding it up and wiping her mouth with it before flushing it down the toilet.

"You okay?" You asked gently, she nodded and pulled herself away from you. "What's wrong?"

"My breath stinks." She mumbled behind her hand, you chuckled and opened the cabinet next to you.

"Ah look, new pack of toothbrushes." You stood up and reached for the top cabinet to get toothpaste, handing it to Pieck's curled up form.

Gratefully, she took the two items and was quick to start brushing her teeth. You helped her stay standing and laid her on the floor once she finished. Sitting next to her with your legs crossed, Pieck did the same and leaned her head on your shoulder.

"Thank you for this." Pieck said quietly

"Of course, I know you'd do the same for me." After a couple beats of silence, she lifted her head from your shoulder and looked into your eyes.

"Hey..."

"Yeah, what's up?"

"you know I like hanging out with you" she said sentimentally, you smiled at her words.

"Aw I like hanging out with you too."

"I think I really wanna kiss you..." she confessed, you blinked rapidly — your mind not catching up fast enough.

"Wait...really?" You blurted out

"Yeah but I don't wanna scare you."

"O-oh no, it's cool." Your breath caught in your throat as you finished speaking.

You weren't the quickest thinker in the world, especially when you forced yourself to rush things. It felt like running in a dream. You need to go but your feet weren't catching up to you, they moved slow and felt even heavier which only made you even more scared. It made you more aware of your surroundings. And by god if this was you dream you wish you could've pinched yourself awake.

But it wasn't. You couldn't. And you didn't notice how close she was until her lips met yours into a soft kiss. Your first kiss. One you didn't expect to ever happen with a woman, much less Pieck. It wasn't her fault though. Pieck was perfect in every sense of the word. Shes kind, beautiful, open minded, and an amazing friend, but that's all she was to you...a friend. Thinking of her in that way felt wrong, wrong to her, wrong to yourself and wrong to the only woman who clouded your thoughts more than anything else. The woman you wanted to have this moment with even if you didn't know it yet. And as soon as your lips met the other girl's, you knew.

You like Yelena.

And if time would let you, you would tell her. If you could, you would run into her arms right now and confess how you felt even if she didn't feel the same way back. If you could...this would've never happened. You would've pushed Pieck away and told her that you only saw her as a friend, a good friend and you didn't want to ruin that. You would've done a lot of things different.

You would've locked that dammed door. Had you have locked it, Yelena wouldn't have slammed it open, ready to complain about the struggle it was to get even a water bottle at this godforsaken frat house. Had you have locked it, you wouldn't have to see the pained nearly heartbroken expression on the blonde woman's face as she realized the scene in front of her. Her face hardened after a few second, throwing away any emotion on her face and reverting back to that blank slate face she always had.

"Yelena..." you breathed out, as quickly as she came, Yelena turned around and left the room.

Immediately standing up and rushing out of the room, you were able to catch the tall woman before she left down the hall.

"Yelena, wait! Please—" you tried to grabbed her wrist, only to have her snatch it out of your hold like you had burned her. "Please just let me explain."

"Explain? Explain what?" Yelena snapped, you took a step back at her abrupt defense but sighed and gathered your thoughts.

"Look I'm sorry it's just— Pieck she's drunk and- and she just started to lean in, I didn't know what to do. I'm so sorry." You apologized profusely and bowed you head down, grabbing her hands in yours. After not hearing a response from Yelena, you looked up to see her beginning to laugh.

"Wow, that's hilarious." She laughed, your heart clenched.

"W-what?" She stopped laughing and looked down at you, tilting her head to the side and snatching her hands out of yours.

"It's hilarious, you're explaining yourself to me like you're my bitch or something." You flinched at her harsh words, "Let me explain." She slammed her hand down on your shoulder condescendingly, "You're not my bitch. You're not my girlfriend. And neither is Pieck, if you wanna fuck like rabbits you go right ahead and do that — but don't think for a second that I give a fuck about either of you. You got that?" She ranted, flicking your forehead and walking away, not looking back once.

Maybe you were wrong about that. Confessing at least. Because after that, you didn't think there was any way in hell Yelena would ever listen to anything you had to say again. Your heart clenched painfully as your throat tightened, that familiar burning sensation at the back of your eyeballs began and you dropped your head down. Crying in public, not something you ever enjoyed or had experienced up until now. Up until now, no physical pain could hurt as much as this.

Warm arms wrapped themselves around you carefully and that strong scented cologne filled your nose, one you had made fun of Porco for having but couldn't help loving how it smelled. And at that moment, you let it go. Not caring who walked past with judgmental stares or glances of sympathy, you stayed there and cried.

A tap on your shoulder made you turn around, only to be faced with your short dark haired roommate once more. A saddened look on her face as she opened her mouth, the apology on the tip of her tongue,

"Please Pieck..." you pleaded, shaking your head and moving out of Porco's embrace. Numbly. You walked. Down the stairs, past the people, out the door and into the passenger seat of the car, not lifting your head once.

Tonight...tonight was a night you never wanted to come back to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How’d y’all like the Angst? 😏


	7. Sawney & Bean

  
**WHEN YOU WERE YOUNGER** , your parents always threatened to make you eat soap if you ever lied, that god would cut off your tongue if you lied to parents. This, although odd, definitely worked out in their favor. You never lied to your parents growing up and if you did, you'd immediately run to the local church to repent and cry about not wanting your tongue cut off. Even to this day you had a hard time lying to them.

Which definitely explained why you lied about Porco being your boyfriend that one time.

Nevertheless, there was nobody else you'd choose to lie about being your boyfriend. Zeke was not a close friend of yours, the two of you barley ever talked or interacted unless Yelena or Pieck was around so he was out of the question. And his brother was most certainly out of the question. Eren Yeager doesn't seem like the type of guy you take home to meet the parents. Then again, you don't usually bring a woman back home to meet the parents.

Porco was honest. He never sugarcoated things, never lied to you and told you anything he needed to say straight to your face opposed to going behind your back and talking about you to others. And especially after the party situation, he was extra honest about how everything went down. Told you about yourself, about Yelena and about Pieck, even. Told you about how it wasn't your fault but also how couldn't let your first girl crush slip away that easy.

He let you stay in his dorm while he roommate was away until you could face Pieck again. While you knew it wasn't her fault, you still felt guilty about pushing her away like that. But what else were you gonna do? Pop into the room like nothing happened and move on with your life? Yes, but you didn't have the balls to do it, not yet at least.

For now, you were here. Laying in Porco's bed, under a mountain of blankets, stuffing your face with chips and snacks to fill whatever longing clung onto you like a parasite.

"You can't just lay in bed all day." Porco stated, flicking the fluorescent lights on and nearly blinding you. You whined and pulled the covers over your head.

"Who says I can't?" You mumbled under the bedsheets

"Me." Porco yanked the blanket off of you, "Plus you're getting crumbs all over my bed, asshole." He complained, wiping down the bed.

You sighed and looked up at him, "you're mean."

"I know, it keeps me awake at night." He said unconvincingly. Porco dropped his phone on his desk and wrapped his hands around your ankles, pulling you off the bed slowly till your bottom hit the floor. "Get up. We're meeting Hange at their apartment in 15 minutes."

You jumped up at the name, your mood instantly being brought up slightly at the thought of seeing them again. The one person you could never distance yourself from was always Hange. Sometimes you'd need a break from Porco but then Hange would appear, a bright smile on their face, ready to take your mind off of anything. If they weren't already taken by Moblit, you most definitely would've married them by now.

The buzzing noise coming out of the silver button outside of the apartment complex had you taking your eyes off of your surroundings. Quite frankly, you hadn't really done much exploring of the nearby city in your college. Too much school work and the constant looming fear of being kidnapped/sex trafficked was enough to keep you in the confinement's of your— Porco's room.

"Who is it?" Asked a voice

"Your only friends." Porco mocked, a gasp was heard from the other line and another loud buzzing noise set off, allowing the two of you to enter the building.

After taking the elevator up to the fifth floor and walking down the hall, hearing muffled shouting coming from behind Hange's door. Porco raised his fist and sighed.

"Hange has a lot of pets so just...be careful." He mentioned

"Oh that's okay, I love animals." You dismissed, waving your hand down. Porco gave you an 'I warned you' look and knocked on the door, moments pausing the shouting.

Yanking the door open, out appeared Hange. Their ponytail tied messily on the head, their hands fitting into some thick white gloves and in their arms was two small black and white Boston terriers. Along with Hange came out a much larger brown colored pit bull, immediately sniffing you up.

"Welcome! Come in, come in!" Hange exclaimed, moving out the way and allowing the two of you to move past the large dog and enter their surprisingly spacious apartment.

You looked around curiously, wondering how college student could afford to live somewhere so...expensive. Rustic hardwood flooring under your feet, sage green cabinets and a beautiful white counter top island, plants filling all and any open spaces, it all felt very Hange. Three large windows encompassed the living room walls as an all white cat laid back on the edge, briskly taking in the soft sun. As messy and out of place of a person Hange usually is, their apartment was surprisingly spotless. Well, besides the many little animals running around.

"Oh since you haven't been here before, let me introduce you to the club. These twin puppies are Sawney and Bean. The big one here is Nyx." they pointed at the beige colored pit bull that propped itself up on the couch and the small terrier's in their arms. Putting down the dogs, they began their wild arm waving they tended to do whenever they began talking about things they liked.

"The cat is Marshmallow, she's very lazy. Oh! I also have a snake named Lev, named him after Levi since they're both always snappy. And a bearded dragon named Noodles. I have a couple rats too but I wouldn't really consider them pets, more like...Lev's lunch." They snapped their finger, pointing up. "Which reminds me." They walked towards their freezer, pulling out a ziplock bag with a tiny frozen little rat in it and left your line of vision.

You and Porco shared a look. He shook his head and sat down on the plush pale yellow couch, getting comfortable and petting the dogs. With a smile, you joined him, having no problem interacting with the adorable animals. Not long after, Hange stumbled out of the back room with three leashes and quickly being bombarded by the dogs excitedly wagging their tails.

"Uh I have to walk the dogs but I...need someone to watch Lev and Noodles." Hange explained sheepishly,

"I'll walk them with you." You offered

"No! Uh- I mean you don't have to." They exclaimed, you shrugged and looked over at Porco

"I want to, besides I'm sure Porco can watch a couple reptiles without pissing himself, right?" You joked and stood up off the couch, the blonde shot you an unamused look.

"Ah but I don't wanna get in the way of your little honeymoon stage." You looked at Porco wide eyed, "I know when I was in the honeymoon stage with Moblit all I ever wanted to do was introduce him to anyone and everything, even my stuffed animals." Hange rambled, you sighed not wanting to correct them and simply nodded,

"Right...well I'll take Nyx and you can have the twins." You gently grabbed the red leash handle, smiling down at the happily wagging dog. Hange hesitantly following you out the door and down the elevator.

Once you reached the bottom and took a breath of the outside air as you both made your way to the dog park, you decided it was a good time to bring it up.

"Hey Hange..." you spoke up, they hummed and looked at you when Sawney took a pee break "Why did you say that? Back there about...me and Porco."

"Oh...are you not dating?" They asked, surprised

"I-no Hange. We're just friends." You chuckled nervously

"Ah okay. Well you can't blame me. After the night a couple weeks ago I saw the two of you hugging outside your dorm and then now, you're sleeping in his dorm, spending more time with him...just an observation." Hange observed, shrugging their shoulders and continuing their walk.

You stopped walking

"That was you?" You asked incredulously, Hange stopped walking once they noticed you lagging behind and turned around, "That night last week, you were the one standing around the corner?"

"Huh? Yeah...sorry if that sounds weird! I-I didn't mean to eavesdrop, I swear!" Hange exclaimed, apologizing profusely. You shook your head and walked next to them.

"No no don't worry, I'm not mad at you I just...I thought you were...someone else" your words drifted off as you thought back to the woman you promised yourself you wouldn't look back on. Hange tilted their head

"Eh? Who did you think I was?" They questioned

"No one"

"Oh, please, please, please, please tell me! Nobody ever tells me anything!" They pleaded, grabbing your open hand excitedly with puppy dog eyes behind their glasses. You chuckled at their childish behavior and sighed.

"I don't know...I thought you were...Yelena." You breathed out her name for the first time since the incident, still feeling your heart longing for the short haired blonde woman.

"Yelena? Why would you think I was...? Actually, never mind."

"No no no, you don't get to 'never mind' me, what do you mean?" You giggled, pushing them lightly

"If I didn't think you were straight, I'd definitely think you, Yelena and Pieck had some weird friends with benefits polyamorous sex thing going on." You gasped and grabbed their arm as they began bursting out laughing, their infectious laugh catching onto you and turning you both into a laughing mess.

"Are you serious?" You asked through your laughs,

"Yes! I mean, I don't know if you've notice but...Yelena looks at you like won their the lottery and signed her name onto a marriage certificate or something. Pieck, on the other hand already has that whole friends with benefits thing going on with her, maybe not anymore though."

"Pfft yeah...right." You waved off the first part of their explanation with a wave, "How do you know they're not...anymore." Hange lowered their head and looked at you through their eyelashes, you rolled your eyes and shook your head. "I'm not interested in her."

"Mmh, Mhm okay I'll let you keep lying to yourself but to ease your, very interested mind— I don't know for sure, it's just an observation again." You hummed and sat down on a park bench, letting Hange remove the clip of the dog leash and allow her three dogs to run around the empty dog park.

Silence draped over you two like a warm blanket, leaving room for any secrets or tales to be told. It was a blanket that you loved. Especially when it was with Hange. They had such a childlike yet free aura, you couldn't help but follow like a moth to a light. Too wild and taken to ever be romantic but just right enough to make the best friend you could've ever made at college.

Grateful wasn't a word that came come to describe it. Horrible, awful and painfully anxious could definitely describe school though. Hair pulling, skin picking, nail biting, fidgeting, you name it you were doing it as you stressed yourself over the textbook in front you. It felt as if the words were flying past your head, nothing clicking, no thoughts being thunk, it all felt like too much.

No matter how loud or quiet it was in the library, you couldn't help but distract yourself with any and everything that would take your mind off of the piles of work in front of you. You sighed, dropping your pen between the middle of the textbook and running your hands on top of your head, feeling an oncoming headache. Standing up from your seat, you closed your book and walked along the bookshelf's mindlessly.

Running your hands along the soft brown wood, finger dipping in and out of each crevice of every book in the fiction section. It all felt very...familiar. Yet you didn't seem to know where you were going until a cracking old book caught your attention once more, as it did the first time you saw it.

Alice in Wonderland. 

As you stopped in your tracks, you didn't even realize the person walking the opposite way of you and your shoulders slammed against each other.

"Oh shit, I'm sorry I wasn't—" you stuttered, doing a double take at the face you couldn't seem to get out of your mind, you gasped. "Yelena..."

"Oh...it's you" she said, looking you up and down before turning around to walk the other direction.

"Wait!" You shouted, Yelena stopped in her tracks and turned around slightly, "I'm sorry."

"For?"

"For that night...at the party." You looked down at your hands, remembering the night.

"Why would you apologize?" Yelena asked after a moment of silence

"Um...because..." you racked your brain thinking of something to apologize for but couldn't come up with anything.

"You have a bad habit of that, darling." She smirked

Your head snapped up to look at her, "What?"

"If anything, I should be the one apologizing. What I said was...I was an asshole, I'll admit that and for that, I'm sorry." Yelena apologized, you stared at her in shock, your mouth hanging open.

Yelena chuckled at your reacted and reached her hand over to shut your open mouth.

"Careful, you'll catch flies." She joked, "Why are you so surprised I apologized? I'm not a man, remember?" You couldn't help the snort that made its way up your nose and the laughs that followed afterwards. Covering your mouth with your hand, you laughed at her very true response.

Yelena tilted her head and wrapped her hand gently around yours, lowering it away from your mouth.

"Stop doing that. I like your smile." She complimented. You dropped your hand and shook your head.

"God, I hate you," you breathed out, trying to hide away into your hoodie.

Yelena smirked and placed her finger under your chin, lifting your head up to meet her eyes.

"I know." She teased.

Your cheeks burned at how hard you were smiling, almost not realizing your name being called from afar. You turned your head to the side and found Pieck walking towards the both of you.

"Yelena? Hey guys..." you pulled away from Yelena and stood in front of her, getting closer to the dark haired roommate you'd been avoiding.

"Pieck, hey uh, Yelena can you let us talk for a second." You asked, not turning around to face her and keeping your eyes on Pieck. "What-...What are you doing here?"

"It's the library...public space, y'know?" Pieck shrugged nonchalantly

"Right. Um- shit sorry I don't know—" you sputtered. Truly, you didn't know what to say. You've never been in this situation before and despite this not being your fault, you couldn't stop apologizing.

Pieck giggled and placed her hands on your shoulders, "Hey, why are you so stiff? Relax, kid you have nothing to apologize for."

"But...the party—"

"Who cares about the party? I do a lot of stupid things when I'm drunk, it doesn't mean anything. I'm still your best friend slash roommate slash therapist, right?" Pieck questioned hopefully, you sighed and nodded.

"Yes, of course, I'm sorry."

"Shut up with this apologizing bullshit, come here." She complained, pulling you into a hug. Gratefully, you accepted her offer and wrapped your arms around her small frame.

Not feeling the woman's heart clench as she held in her arms, watching Yelena stand at the end of the hall.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kind of a filler chapter but lmk how you think about it and about the new episode👀


	8. Mrs. Potato Head

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: mentions of weight, binge eating/not eating at all, and harsh words towards said people. I will put the first words and ends of the dialogue in capital and bold in case you would like to skip past it.

**FEELING HAPPY** was a rare emotion these days. With school, taxes, jobs and all sorts of adulting things, it felt like you could never take breath and just relax. But moments like these are what made it all worth it.

Music blasting in your ears with a red solo cup in your hand as you sat on the comfortable couch, laughing your head off. The short wood coffee table in front of you was occupied by a drunk and rambling Hange who claimed they had to stand on top of a high surface to get their point across. Along with an equally drunk Pieck who used her past experience as a bartender to mix and match as many drinks she could find.

A party within the walls of Hange's apartment walls for just the three of you.

Just as Hange neared the end of their speech, the music changed and they immediately cut themselves off excitedly. "Oh my god, I love this song!" They gasped.

Pieck gasped as well and looked at you, "Let's dance!" You shook your head and watched nearly in tears as her and Hange began dancing wildly on the table.

Although you wouldn't really call it dancing, more like flinging their limbs around like chicken on ice skates. Watching as Hange's foot nearly slipped, you gasped and reached over to hold their waist before they tumbled down and the three of you stood in silence before the two drunkards bursted into laughter once more. You sighed and chuckled lightly, being the only sober one in the room meant any and all responsibilities fell on you.

Genuinely though, you didn't mind. Nothing had ever felt more refreshing than this moment for you, just being here and having fun with friends was not a luxury you had growing up. You'd forever wonder how people as magnificent as Pieck and Hange came into your life. Angels in disguise.

But the buzzing in your back pocket had pulled your attention away from your intoxicated friends and it only took one read on the contact name to have your mood dropped instantly. You immediately stood up and walked out towards the apartment door.

"Hey, where are you going?" Pieck called out to you

"I'll be right back!"

Shutting the door behind you to drown out the loud music, you picked up the call.

"Mom?"

"Hey hun, how's school?" She asked, you sighed and leaned against a nearby wall

"Good. Kind of hard but-"

"I hope you're keeping those grades up, young lady. We can take away college as quickly as we gave it to you, don't forget that." She threatened sharply, you ignored the ball in your throat and shook your head.

"I know..."

"Although, I suppose you coming back home wouldn't be all that bad, would it? You could go meet the new priest, he's around your age and quite handsome if I do say so myself. Ah, you could live my dream and become an adorable little housewife, isn't that nice?" She cooed, already imagining your future as her dream. You pursed your lips into a thin line and raised your eyebrows sarcastically, already feeling repulsed by the idea.

"Speaking of being a housewife, what ever happened to that one boy you liked? Pete? Was that his name?" She questioned, completely butchering Porco's name.

"Porco, mom. And uh...I don't know. I still have a crush on him and my friend thinks he reciprocates those feelings but...if he won't act on it, does he really feel it?" You ranted, almost forgetting you were on the phone with your mother and had began describing Yelena.

"Oh well boys will be boys. You know, when your father and I were in high school, he was one of those popular guys who didn't play in any sports was so handsome everyone wanted to be his friend. I was a cheerleader and people described us as the perfect couple, even going as far as to put us in the yearbook as "Most Likely To Die Old Together." Haha, good times." you listened even though you'd heard the story over and over again since you were a child.

Back then, you thought it was romantic. A love story so beautiful it should be in fantasy novel. A love you always hoped to find. Back then it was all different. Men didn't care as much to ask for nudes, rush to have sex and then run away when the next hot blonde walks into the room. Those men back then would grow old and bitter men, men who hit their wives and laid around the couch till they grew a beer belly and died of a heart attack— fun, right?

Men now were more selfish, less caring, more manipulative and aggressive. Not all of them, of course but I didn't say all of them were. It is enough men to have you clutching your keys between your fingers con case you were grabbed, enough to make you buy odd nicknacks in order to do anything you could to prevent it all, but even then there is no guarantee any of those will work.

Well maybe you should pray.

Pray for better men? Or to not get kidnapped? Pray for peace or less violence? Pray to be straight or perish in hell. What a fun time it is these days.

Maybe you could forget about it. Forget your kiss with Pieck, forget the party, forget your longing for Yelena and go home. Go home to your parents, the church and repent for all you have sinned. Go home, marry that next door neighbor of yours who used to pull your hair in elementary school and have a couple of bratty little munchkins running around causing trouble. Go home to a life you didn't ask for.

Maybe, you were still just a kid who had no clear path or any idea what to do with this new freedom you were given at a sudden. Maybe the world should stop telling you to get your life together at the age of 18 and maybe instead provide you the help and guidance you need for this new adult life. Maybe the world is just a shitty place you didn't ask to be in.

" **MAYBE IF YOU** lost a little more weight, Porco would notice you more." You were immediately yanked out of your own head as the malice words spat out of your mom's mouth, nearly choking on your own saliva.

"....What?"

"I'm just saying, the last time I saw you were bigger than usual. Maybe that Porco boy doesn't like fat people." She said, not even realizing how damaging her words were in that moment.

"There's nothing wrong with fat people, mom." You sighed, the woman scoffed on the other end.

"Of course there is. I'm just worried about their health i mean. There is no way you can be fat and healthy, it's impossible so take this as a warning, boys don't like big girls — lose some weight and then maybe someone will finally notice you." You took a deep breath, even your own breath stuttering as the words cut a sharp pain in your chest.

"Y-yeah, maybe you're right look I gotta go, I have an essay due in a couple hours. Bye." You stuttering, trying your best not let her hear the crack in your voice.

**"OF COURSE** I'm right, goodbye." Wasting no time in hanging up the call, you slid your back down the wall you were leaning on and tucked into yourself.

Yet with your arms shielding your face from the general eye, you didn't cry. You took sharp stuttered breaths and clenched your jaw, trying to force tears out but ultimately failing. Nails digging into your skin, brain racked with thousands of thoughts and you couldn't pinpoint a single one.

You're just tired.

Tired of finally feeling like you're moving up in life only to be pushed down by your past, tired of not understanding your own self, your own feelings, or your emotions. You hated not knowing how to behave like everyone else, not knowing how to differentiate romantic and platonic love like everyone else, not knowing wether you were actually gay or just found women pretty, and not growing up in an environment where you were taught the differences. It was all bullshit.

"Hey..." whispered a voice from a little ways away, you lifted your head to see Yelena and the man Hange constantly talked about, Levi.

She walked over to you and crouched down, placing a hand on your shoulder. "are you okay?" She asked, you shook your head and stood up.

"What are you guys doing here?" Yelena stood up once more and Levi pulled out the keys to Hange's apartment from his back pocket

"Well I got a call from a very drunk Pieck and he got a got from an equally as drunk Hange so we both came rushing over." Yelena explained

"Were you called here too?" Asked Levi from afar

"No, I've been with them all day. I just came out here to take a call."

"Well looks like we're all in for a surprise." Levi sighed as he finally pried the door open.

The music that had been previously blasting was still playing yet the two participants who were once dancing and yelling on the table were now in a deep sleep, cuddled up together on the couch. Drool ran down the side on Hange's lips and Pieck nearly had her entire body enclosed around the brunette with Hange snoring.

Yelena snorted at the sight and pulled her phone out of her back pocket, taking a picture before looking at Levi who stared at the two of them in disgust.

"I'll get to cleaning." Levi announced

"I'll get them to bed." Yelena replied.

You aided Yelena and wrapped Hange's arm around your shoulder with Yelena on the other side. The drunk in your arms mumbled incoherent words of their pets and how they wanted French fries as the two of you carried them into their bedroom and tucked them into bed. When you made your way back to the living room, Levi had already cleaned up ninety percent of the mess and was now doing dishes.

"Yo, Levi, you need a ride?" Yelena asked

"No, i'll sleep on the couch. Lord knows they're gonna need all sorts of medication when they wake up." The man assured.

"Hey...is that Levi I see?" slurred out the drunk woman who suddenly woke up, "What is up, little man? Haven't seen you in a while."

Yelena covered her mouth to stop the laugh that nearly escaped.

"You saw me last week, Pieck." Levi scoffed, you chuckled and walked over to her, pulling her into a seating position.

Her eyes drooped heavily and her hands reached out to messily touch her face, giggling to herself and saying your name. "Oh hey girl, where did you go? Were you gonna ditch us? Did Porco come over? Is that Yelena?" She questioned throughly, some of her words barley making sense.

"My mom called, come on let's go home." You stood up and held out your hands for her which she took gratefully before dropping her entire body weight on you. You groaned at the added weight until two fingers tapped your shoulder.

"Here, I got this." Yelena assured you, pulling Pieck off of your before sliding one arm under the back of her knees and the other under her armpits. The surprised look on your face made the blonde smirk, "Trust me, this isn't the first time this has happened and it probably won't be the last."

Bidding your goodbyes to Levi, you held each and every door open for Yelena until you made your way to her car and held the back door open for her. As Yelena lowered Pieck into the car, the brunette's head banged against the top of the car. You let out a gasp as Yelena hissed and rubbed the spot when Pieck began whining and holding the side of her head. It was only when the taller woman pulled away from the car that you put the upper half of your body inside to check on your roommate who had already fallen asleep.

Stepping out of the car, you noticed Yelena leaning against it with her hand over her mouth. You sucked your teeth and hit her arm.

"Not funny." You warned, walking to the passenger seat

"It's kinda funny." She shrugged and walked to the drivers side.

Once she started the car and hit the breaks, the three of you were on your commute back to the college. The sky had already begun wrapping itself across the area, turning the once blue sky into deep purple and pink. You watched as tall buildings, fancy stores and hundreds of people walked through the city, a sight you never got to see before. Only when your window rolled down did you finally notice Yelena's gaze on you.

Staring had become your only form of communication. It was a contest of sorts. Yet staring isn't quite the word for what Yelena does, though she'd fit the dictionary definition to a tee. Her eyes rest, not unblinking but slowed; yet the effect is soft and inviting instead of harsh. Perhaps it is her lips that give away her intention, not quite smiling but tilting as if they mean to.

But a sharp intake of breath had her gaze turned elsewhere as Pieck suddenly rose from the backseat to squeeze her head between the two front seats.

"I wanna go to the beach..." she mumbled tiredly, you patted her head and told her to lean back to which she did not listen to and instead leaned into your hand.

"No." Yelena replied bluntly. You looked down at Pieck and saw her bottom lip quivering as tears filled her eyes. Eyes widening, you looked at Yelena who simply sat there, nonchalant.

"But why?" Pieck dragged out her words, her cries filling the car walls.

Yelena rolled her eyes, "Because it's getting late and cold." An answer that only caused the girl to cry even harder, clutching your arm in an almost painful grip as she sobbed into it.

You looked at Yelena with pleading eyes, she looked at you for a second before shaking her head and looking back at the road.

"No."

"Please, Yelena!" You begged, she shook her head again. "Oh come on, give the poor girl something."

"Tch" Yelena sucked her teeth and avoided your eyes, you continued you to stare at her with puppy eyes until her eyes finally looked over to you.

Stopping the car at a red light, she sighed and leaned her head back and repeated your name in a whisper over and over again before lifting her head once more.

"I hate you guys..." she said, starting up the car again.

You cheered lowly and clapped, Pieck gasped and raised her arms above her head, cheering much louder than you. The commute was long enough to get there just as the purple hues in the sky turned into a dark navy color and stars filled the void. As Yelena pulled into a nearby parking spot, you turned around in your seat to wake up your sleeping roommate who instantly shot up at the mention of the beach and gasped at the sight.

"We're here! Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you!" She exclaimed, leaning over the open space in the middle to try and plant a kiss on Yelena's lips. The blonde turned her head just in time for Pieck to only kiss the sides of her mouth, the drunk woman didn't seem to care and went back to her side, opening the car door and running out excitedly.

The two of you didn't mention it and opted on turning off the car and stepping out to make sure Pieck didn't go in the water. You walked to Yelena's side of the car and stood next to her.

"Let's hope she does eat sand out there." Yelena joked, you giggled and watched Pieck try and fail at doing a cartwheel.

"She's having fun, why didn't you want to come?"

"Because Pieck is a manipulative little drunk. She cries and whines until you either do what she wants or she forgets and falls asleep, I was trying to go for the latter but someone foiled my plans." She explained, looking at you with raised eyebrows. You held your arms up in a surrendering position.

"Um I was not aware of that so you can't even blame me." You said, dropping your hands into your back pockets and shivered at the cold air hitting you.

Noticing your shivers, Yelena shrugged of her blazer and swung it over your shoulders, warmth enveloping you. You opened your mouth to give it back but she simply shook her head.

"It's fine, I'll live." She dismissed, you nodded and slide your hands through the sleeves. The sleeves reaching past your wrist due to Yelena tall stature and the strong scent of vanilla and mint hitting your nostrils as you breathed in the smell.

"Why is it every time I see you, you're dressed in some fancy get up?" You questioned curiously

"That would be Zeke's fault. He's always trying to grow more investments and stuff, today he met with a couple rich friends of his to get a small percentage of their businesses. And guess who had to tag along?" Yelena divulged, you nodded.

"What kind of business does he do?"

"Eh regular stuff, sometimes gets extra privileges cause of the rich friends I mentioned. He's actually the reason Hange lives in that apartment you were in earlier, not that Levi was happy about that."

"Levi? Do they not like each other?" Yelena snorted at your question.

"Pfft, 'not like' is the kind way of putting it. Zeke's trying to catch up to Levi's success ever since Levi's uncle Kenny died and he took over Ackerman Co." you jaw dropped

"Wait, Levi is he owner of Ackerman Co?!" You exclaimed, shocked.

"Yeah. Kenny Ackerman used to run it but then he died and Levi took over. Ackerman's are the only people who can ever even touch that estate with a ten foot pole, and when Levi's time is up then his cousin Mikasa Ackerman will take over as owner." She disclosed, you blinked at all this information.

"Wow.... I'm surprised Levi even has friends, what with being that rich and all."

"If you're talking about Hange, they're the only exception. They became friends before Kenny died and Hange just never left Levi alone so now they're attached at the hip. As much as he hates it." You chuckled lightly, already knowing how Hange is, you knew there was no way they'd ever leave a friend like that in a critical time. You admired them for that.

"What about you?" Yelena spoke up

"Huh?"

"Why were you curled up in a ball outside Hange's apartment while they were in there drinking their life away with Pieck?" She questioned, you sighed and crossed your arms over your chest.

"Noth—"

"Don't. Don't even start with that shit." Yelena stated, she pushed herself off the car and stood in front of you, her long arms caging you in between her body and the car. "Talk to me." She whispered, you looked down.

"I-...It was my mom she-...I don't know, it wasn't that big of a deal." You tried dismissing the topic as you shook your head but Yelena was not taking it.

"If it hurt your feelings or made you upset then yes, it is that big of deal. Stop undermining your own feelings because you think it's not important." She demanded, sucked in a breath and tried again.

"I told her I had a crush on Porco a while back and she asked me about it today, I said I didn't think he likes me and she-...she said and I quote, "maybe if you lost a little more weight Porco would notice you"" Yelena's jaw clenched but she refrained from speaking and let you continue. "And-and I don't like Porco so it shouldn't have hurt my feelings that much but I..." your words had spilled out much faster as tears brimmed in your waterline and your breath hiccuped.

Yelena's heart squeezed at the tears rolling down your cheeks, she stood to her full height and tugged you into her arms, patting your head affectionately. Not even caring to try to hide your feelings, you let yourself sob into Yelena's chest, most likely standing her white button up. Your fingers clutched her back tightly, trying to find any grip on reality you could.

No words were, or had to be spoken as she held you in her arms. The two of you holding each other in silence for what felt like hours as you poured all those bottled up tears out onto Yelena, who wanted nothing more than to take away any sadness you had ever felt and carry it all on her shoulders. For you.

"Don't let anybody determine when your feelings do or do not matter. Your feelings are your own, they are valid, nobody can change that. God, I wish I could give you my eyes so you can see yourself the way I do. I could sit here and tell you over and over again how amazing and beautiful of a human being I think you are but I think you'll find that to be repetitive so I'll just say this." She pulled away and placed both of her hands on your cheeks.

"People's opinion only matters when you let it. If some ugly old hag across the street tells you you're ugly but zendaya tells you you're the hottest person alive, who are you gonna believe?" You giggled at her joke and nodded,

"Your hearts too big for your body, darling. Maybe I shoulder hold it for you."

**Author's Note:**

> This story is also posted on wattpad so if you wanna read it on there my user is “SUGACODED”.


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